Burning the Primrose Path
by celinenaville
Summary: Sam's year at Stanford takes a fortuitous turn as The Yellow-Eyed Demon sends Tyson Brady to start pulling the strings to move him along their chosen path...toward a beautiful blonde called Jessica Moore. *COMPLETED*
1. Chapter 1

**Burning the Primrose Path**

 _Def: " **The Primrose Path** refers to a life of ease and pleasure, or to a course of action that seems easy and appropriate but can actually end in calamity."_

The bartender absently wiped out a glass with a cloth, dark eyes trained ahead of him. It was fairly early and the Friday crowd hadn't descended upon them yet. It made it slightly easier to watch the table to his left.

The big wooden support beams standing between his spot behind the bar and the table of college kids framed the scene, lending it the illusion of a moving photograph. A photograph of camaraderie and relaxation. A photograph of friendship and normalcy.

It was all wrong.

 _Intolerably_ wrong.

Sam Winchester gave a shy smile and ducked his head. He traced his thumbnail over a groove formed in the finish of the table as he listened to his friends talk. His eyes remained trained on the thick resin coating, worn from years of use.

Of abuse.

Despite his shyness- that unassuming demeanor that was at its essence 100% pure SAM- his shoulders did not speak of hidden stress. Of tension that buzzed barely beneath the surface. No. He was... relaxed.

Blissfully ignorant of the bartender watching him like a hawk, listening in to every nuance of their conversation punctuated by the loud raucous laughter of young people set free from their duties. Almost Adolescents, Not-Quite-Adults set loose into the world for the first time. Unweighted with adult responsibilities and those which they did carry, borne with the humor and bon vivance of youth.

Sam didn't have quite that ease of spirit, even now. He was relaxed but not intoxicated on his own life force. There was still something in him that spoke of his chaotic youth.

The bartender put away his glass, began to cut lemons, slice, slicing through the skin. The citrus smell hitting his nose, almost tasting the sour on his tongue. He flicked his eyes toward Sam Winchester again. Let his gaze linger.

The kid didn't even know he was being watched. Every hunter's instinct honed in him by his father's training should have been screaming at him. Sent his gut churning a warning, put him on edge.

Even his womanizing sack-of-shit older brother would have been radiating tension, scanning everywhere in the bar, trying to seize onto who or WHAT was observing him. But not Sam. Not now.

Now Sam was absorbed alternately in studying the table before him and flashing shy smiles and the odd remark into the conversation. He stole a fry off of the plate of the pixie stick of a blonde in front of him and she smacked his arm possessively. "Sam! Those are my fries."

He gave her a flash of his dimples. Besides being unaware of the gaze burning into the side of his head from the direction of the bar, he seemed oblivious to the intention of the blue blooded piece of ass in front of him. It was a crying shame.

His friends all seemed straight arrows. The girl, Rebecca, and Zak, her dark-haired brother next to her. And then there was Sam's shadow and best friend, Tyson Brady sitting at his left hand side, where a little over a year ago his brother would have been.

These kids all had pretentious fucked up names like that. Tyson and Zak and Grady and Grayson and Tyler. Parents had to give their special babies special names, unique like snowflakes. Except they were all the fucking same. Next to them "Sam" was almost a laugh.

Sam with his beat up t-shirt and loose jeans picked up at a second hand store, the hems scuffed to hell. Those fucking blue tennis sneakers that he'd had since the day he'd walked out on his Daddy's wrath.

Brady elbowed Sam's arm and motioned for him to grab them more drinks. Sam shook his head, hid beneath his mop of brown bangs and finally gave in, giving Brady a slap on the back as he slid his chair out and stood up.

The young Winchester had already put on height in a few short months, inches even.

The bartender's eyes went to Brady briefly. Sam's All-American chiseled jawed friend looked a little stressed. The weary tension rolling off him in a wave despite his perfect bonded teeth and styled blonde hair. He was under stress. Probably mid-terms. Long hours studying. Not sure if he'd make the cut.

The bartender smiled as Sam approached. Put away his lemons, wiped his hands on a striped bar towel.

"Hey," Sam looked out from under his mop of bangs. "The waitress sort of went MIA and I need a couple of beers. You have _Arrogant Bastard_ on tap?"

The bartender smiled. "Do I ever, kid. You got an ID?"

"I got carded at the door." Sam waved back vaguely toward their table.

"Yeah, well show me again. I know that guy doesn't pay attention half the time."

Sam reached into the back pocket of his jeans and pulled out a battered leather wallet, showed his ID.

Sam Winchester, twenty one years old.

He'd probably made it himself. Kid had more fake IDs at 16 than most spies.

But the difference here was that this was under his real name. Progress. Sammy going legit. He even caught sight of a credit card in his actual name. The miracles never ceased.

The bartender turned his back to fill the draft and smiled watching the liquid fill the glass in a heady foam. "You sure don't look 21, Sammy."

"It's Sam." He replied defensively without skipping a beat. "And yeah, I look young for my age. I hear that a lot."

The bartender glanced up in the mirror behind the bar, saw Sam watching him with a furrowed brow before they locked gazes through the mirror and the kid looked back at his friends.

"How many do you want, or am I supposed to guess."

The bartender blinked once and didn't bother to hide his yellow eyes. When Sam turned back they were brown again.

"Two." Sam said.

Azazel smiled and handed Sam the glasses. He cocked his head, a show of teeth. "Here's your _Arrogant Bastard,_ kid."

* * *

Azazel made a show of wiping down the counter as Sam walked away. The kid didn't give him a second glance. Not once. He didn't look up from his table of friends, didn't even pause to take notice of the patrons as they started to file in.

It was a goddamned crying shame. All that potential, all that training and drilling and honing. He was the favorite.

Azazel knew better than to put all his eggs in one basket, of course he did. There were others but none of them, not a one, held a candle to Sam Winchester.

Sam had some unspoken power in him, something that hummed with life. And not just the power that he had from Azazel's blood gift to him. No. There was something in Sam's very spirit. That unbreakable stubborn will combined with that quick intellect. The combat training and weapons expertise that meant if push came to shove, Sam could be a stone cold killer like his older brother. And on top of all that, the kid was growing up to be a giant buck of a man. He was already taller than anyone around him and his bone structure hinted at sheer physical power when he truly matured.

It was a goddamn waste to see him piss it away at Stanford with these soft, spoiled rotten rich kids who'd never seen a day's hard work, probably couldn't change the oil in their own BMWs.

It'd been essential to get him away from under Daddy's thumb. But this complacency wouldn't do. Not at all.

People were starting to mill about the bar and stand in the way. Azazel took the orders as they came, slipping in smiles and nods and Nicholson charm.

The more he watched Brady, the more he saw signs of the blonde Ken doll's stress. Poor little pre-med student. Bit off more than he could chew, needed that vacation after mid-terms.

He'd do nicely. Beautifully, actually. The closest point of access to Sam. And so wide open for possession that he didn't stand a chance.

Azazel would make certain that Sam Winchester wasn't out of the running. It wouldn't take too much effort after all, just some nudging in the right direction. Sam couldn't be pushed. Pushing made him recalcitrant and stubborn. He'd sink his heels in and plant himself like a mule. But nudging, suggesting, baiting him with a little carrot here and there. Well that had worked the kid's whole goddamn life.

A little training, they'd have him heading right in the direction he wanted him to go. Azazel was betting on this dark horse.

 **tbc...**


	2. Chapter 2

Sam Winchester was back at his usual haunt the next day. He had on one of his old t-shirts, a ratty blue thing with an AC/DC logo on it... a hand me down from his long absent older brother.

Azazel watched him from the corner, absently wiping the empty bar down with a towel. After a few days wearing this meatsuit, he had to admit that it seemed to be growing into a comfortable fit.

Sam's bangs were tousled over his forehead, falling into his eyes. He smiled brightly and sat down across from his friend. "Hey Brady."

"Hi." Brady snapped his text book shut and shoved it into the black leather bag he had hidden under the table.

Sam cocked his head. "Seriously? You brought your text books with you to unwind?"

Brady looked up, blue eyes red rimmed from lack of sleep. His hair askew. Only he didn't wear it like Sam. Sam's hair said that he couldn't be bothered to mess with it. That he just showered, toweled it off and let it fall where it may...which Azazel noted _always_ resulted in the kid looking like a heartthrob from some boy band.

Brady's messy hair seemed totally out of place. It gave the impression that he was too stressed to comb it and put in his apricot-scented rich boy styling goop.

"Oh come on," Sam said in a tone meant to buoy his friend's sagging confidence. "You're not still stressing about finals? You'll do fine. They're not even coming up until after the break."

Sam leaned across the table and gave a playful kick to the young man's expensive penny loafer.

There was no return shove. "I'm not like you man, I can't learn by osmosis...or however the hell you learn." Brady looked tired. Very tired. A little unglued even.

Sam seemed uncertain, then kicked at his loafer playfully again in something mildly reminiscent of the way his older brother used to tease him. "You'll do fine."

A blonde cream puff of a teenage wet dream came to see if Sam wanted anything to drink.

The taller boy leaned back and ordered an _Arrogant Bastard._ Both youths seemed oblivious to the _please fuck me signals_ she was giving off toward Sam.

Azazel smirked. Goddamn shame. That was one thing the older brother had been good for. He never would have let her get away without at least pointing her interest out to Sam. Tyson Brady looked like a completely ineffectual wingman. He seemed like an ineffectual _everything,_ actually. Like someone who should have been a square-jawed popular jock but wasted it with his nose in a book. Just like his best friend. Those pathetic fucking goody two shoes didn't notice the opportunities at all.

In the couple days that Azazel had been wearing this meatsuit to gather intel on the young Winchester, he'd personally indulged in enough college pussy to keep him nice and warm in Hell for a few months. Being a bartender seemed like a little paid vacation.

The waitress set the ale down in front of Sam a few minutes later and tossed her long blonde hair over one shoulder, cocked her head at him with a smile.

He smiled back and it lit up his corner of the room. Damn that kid had charisma. Not quite so much as his brother but enough. And much more than his sad sack of shit father had had since Azazel had taken away Mary Winchester.

Talk about not getting over something. My god. You'd think the man couldn't have found another bitch to take her place in nearly 20 years.

The waitress turned to leave and Azazel caught Sam surreptitiously glancing at her ass as she left.

Bingo! The boy was alive.

So...Sammy Winchester had a type. Leggy blonde chicks like dear old mommy. The demon wasn't sure exactly what to make of _that_ oedipal complex...only that it was there. He'd file that under useful information.

"I'm going to flunk out of pre-med." Brady declared, looking beleaguered.

Sam's brows knitted together. "What? Brady, that's ridiculous. You've got like a 3.8 or something."

"3.5"

That's _not_ flunking out."

"If I want to continue to med school that is abysmal."

"You're overreacting."

"Yeah easy for you to say. You could probably take my tests _now_ and ace them."

Sam shook his head. "Yeah, keep telling yourself that. Look, go home, have a restful relaxation period and come back and kick ass."

Brady shook his head and took a pull of his bottle. "Yeah. Restful. Home. Of course." He seemed to pull himself back out of his funk and seriously focused on Sam. "Where are you going for break? "

Sam shrugged. "I dunno. I figured I'd stick around here. Maybe pick up some more hours working at the bookstore."

Brady studied Sam a moment in a way that made the Winchester look distinctly uncomfortable. "I know you and your dad don't get along well but why don't you go hang with your brother?"

Sam started to shrug.

"I mean you _do_ have a brother right? You didn't, like, _make him up_ as an elaborate cover story to hide that you live in the cupboard under the stairs in your Aunt and Uncle's house, right?"

Sam smirked and took a drink. "No. Dean is very real, I promise."

"And..." Brady let the question hang, his blue eyes showing a bit of interest. A bit of spunk somewhere in that good boy exterior.

"And what?"

"You've never even like talked to him since I've known you... why?"

Sam shrugged. "He's busy... and we just... we're just really different people."

"Ummm." Brady pointedly let his eyes skim Sam's disheveled blue-collar appearance. Such a distinct contrast to his polo shirt and tailored pants and penny loafers. "Genius, so are we."

"Yeah, but..." Sam shrugged, almost flushed a little-the unease pouring off of him in waves.

Brady pushed his fingers through his blonde hair and rolled his shoulders, fighting a muscle knot. "Look, I know you hate to talk about yourself."

"I do not."

"Yes, you do."

"Yeah," Sam conceded. "Maybe."

"But I mean we've been best friends for how long now?"

Sam ducked his head and looked up under his fringe of bangs. "A while."

"So it's time you spilled a little. What's the deal with your brother?" Brady took another sip. "He an asshole or something?"

"What?" The kid looked a little startled by the question. "No. Dean's...he's great."

"And yet you never talk to him."

"It's complicated." Sam peeled at the label on his beer bottle, his fingers sliding on the cold sweat of the glass. "He was kinda mad at me when I left and just..." he huffed in discomfort.

"You don't think he's over it by now?"

Another huff and a shrug. "I don't know."

Brady seemed to be able to read how close he was skating to peril with his interrogation. He broke off and changed the subject. "I'd ask you to my house over break..."

Azazel swallowed a wave of annoyance. It would be so much harder to get to Brady with Sam Winchester around as a buffer. The more isolated Tyson was the better. The more stressed about grades, the more stressed with family, the easier to play with.

Brady continued his sentence. "I'd ask you but it's really just for..."

"Family," Sam said a bit sadly. "I know. I get it. I do."

Oh poor Little orphan Sammy. Almost enough to tug at the heartstrings.

"So maybe you should make up with yours before you die a lonely old man with only a few Stanford buddies to visit your law practice: _Scrooge and Associates."_

"Actually, I think Ebenezer Scrooge worked at _Scrooge and Marley._ " Sam corrected automatically.

"See," Brady said, pointing with his bottle of _Arrogant Bastard,_ "That shit. _That_ shit right there is why your brother doesn't talk to you."

There was a little hurt in Sam's eyes behind the laugh. "Yeah. Probably."

God. He was so soft. Such perfect material but so goddamn soft.

For all Azazel know, he hadn't even killed yet. Sure a couple of salt and burns, a few hunts where he'd watched his brother and father do the dirty work. But _he_ hadn't killed. Not really. He hadn't driven a knife through flesh, felt the blood spatter on his skin and the unholy tremble and shake of the death throws underneath his hand. Until then, Azazel felt that Sam Winchester was a virgin, no matter how much training he'd had.

Azazel knew that he needed to set the dominoes up carefully to assure that when he tipped one the whole stack would fall over. He needed to hurt Sam badly enough that he would have no real hesitation about throwing himself back into The Life when the opportunity arose, when the time grew close to set a master plan in motion. Sam was going to be so fun to play with.

All his life Sam had been easy to herd. Azazel simply needed to put put a few pawns into play, give Sam the choices and he'd consistently chose the correct path. Sometimes the kid's moral fortitude amazed him. But it was that same fortitude that made him ridiculously easy to manipulate.

It was like throwing throwing a puppy into a road and knowing that Sam would stop and save it. Of course he would. So easy to predict. It would be the sweetest victory if that sweet gentle soul ever turned. If Azazel, himself, could do that.

Stanford had been a slight wrench in the flow of the Yellow- Eyed Demon's plans but it could work to his advantage. He just needed that first domino.

He would need Dean later, but for now Sam needed to feel safe and secure in his pointless life here. He needed something to anchor him here and then cause him enough pain to override that sweet, sweet nature. To make him want revenge. To make him want to kill.

Azazel knew how to set that up. He'd take him down the way he'd taken down his father.

All he needed was a sweet, innocent blonde piece of ass.

 **TBC... thanks for the reviews guys. Tara, Mckyd, Michele, cmr. :) I'm not expecting much feedback for this because it's so Sam-centric, but my muse won't leave me alone with it. :)**


	3. Chapter 3

"S..am." The voice on the other end of the phone was broken, choked with some nameless emotion.

Sam stopped rooting around in the little dorm icebox and shut the door, the bottles of beer they always had stocked up with the energy drinks giving the clink of rattling glass as he did. "Brady?" He wrinkled his brow, bracing for the worst, his defenses on guard immediately. "What's wrong?"

"I don't feel well." There was a pause and then he blurted. "I...I'm so confused."

"Woah," Sam said. "Calm down." His own voice took on a tone of patience as he drew himself to his full height, his immediate attention on the pending crisis at hand. "Confused how?"

"I...I can't explain it. It's like I've been blacking out or...something. I..." Brady cleared his throat. There was the sound of him moving, banging into something maybe.

"Are you drinking?"Sam asked.

No response.

"What are you on, man? ...pills? You hitting something stronger than Redbull and Ritalin?" Sam's eyes focused on the labrador picture on the wall. "Brady?"

"I. I'm..." Brady sounded terrifyingly disoriented.

"Okay." Sam ran a hand through his mop of brown bangs. "Let's start with the basics. Where are you?"

A pause. "Home. I'm in my bedroom." Sam realized that the sounds he had heard must have been Brady opening and closing dresser drawers.

"Okay good. Where is your family?"

"They're here."

"Why don't you go and tell them you need to see a doctor, okay? Just stay on the phone with me and go find them and tell them what is happening."

"I can't."

"Why not?"

"I don't know." Distress was creeping into Brady's voice again. "I can't let them know what a f...fuck up I am. I'm such a fuck up, Sam!"

"Tyson..." Sam seldom used his first name. "You're scaring me, man."

"Sam," there was a quaver in the voice and he could almost see Brady huddled next to the wall in his mind's eye. "I just need someone to talk to."

"I'm here." Sam said patiently. "I can't help from where I am. You're states away. I don't even have a car to come get you."

"You don't have to get me." He sounded a little calmer suddenly. "I did get drunk and I woke up and found prescription...something that I must have taken." Sam heard the rattle of a half empty pill bottle. He knew the sound well enough from his father needing constant antibiotics and pain meds.

"Brady. Come on, man. Don't experiment with that shit. I've _told_ you." Sam's voice grew harsh.

"Look, I know chemistry. I've only popped a few Ritalin once or twice to keep me awake and help me focus. You know that. Like literally once or twice."

Sam sighed. Dean had tried to keep his illicit activities largely away from him. The trouble was that Sam wasn't an idiot, and he knew that rather than admit a job was too much for him, Dean would turn to whatever helped him through it. Mostly alcohol and women- but Sam knew on rare occasions he'd used something of the pharmaceutical quality that he'd gotten his hands on somehow.

And here was Brady doing the same thing. Over fucking _med school._.. at least Dean was dealing with life and and death and blood. Then it occurred to him Brady would be too. He'd just be on the repairing end rather than the knifing end.

"Well no more, okay? Just sleep it off, go talk to your family and have a good holiday. And I'll see you in a few weeks, okay?"

"Yeah. Yeah I will. Thanks, buddy. You're always here for me."

Sam huffed, a little exhale through his nose. "Yeah I know." Then slightly suspiciously, as if it forbade something ominous, "Why are you getting all sappy on me?"

A small laugh. "Because you love that shit."

Sam huffed again. "Maybe. I'll be waiting with a dozen roses and a bottle of wine when you come back."

"Good. I like red."

"I know you do. Take care, buddy." Sam's thumb hovered over the end call button when Brady spoke again.

"Sam, how are things with you?"

Sam looked around the empty dorm. He liked having his own space. He was _used_ to being alone while Dad and Dean were on hunts. It gave him time to think. Time to indulge his withdrawn nature. "I'm okay. I'm catching up on reading, picking up some extra hours at work."

"You ever call your brother like I said to?"

Sam paused. "No."

"You should..." Then there was a small hesitant pause and it seemed the timbre of Brady's voice changed just slightly. "Actually. Maybe if you did he wouldn't talk to you. It's been a while right?"

"Yeah," Sam said. "It's been a long time."

"Seems like if he really loved you he'd have made an effort."

Sam snorted, instinctively knowing that that theory was _way_ off the mark. "He loves me. Our family is just screwed up."

"Worse than the Brady's?"

"Way worse."

"You're better than that." Brady sounded strangely authoritative. Confident. "You don't need that crap in your life."

Sam furrowed his brow at the conflicting opinion, chalked it up to whatever drug his friend was coming off of.

"Yeah, well that's partly why I walked out."

There seemed to be pointed interest on the other line of the phone. "You knew when to say you'd had enough. Good for you, Sam. You miss them?"

"Um." Sam hesitated, very uncomfortable with the turn of conversation. "Sometimes, I guess." He felt that hurt flare of anger he often did when he thought about his father throwing him out when he'd been accepted to Stanford. He could keep a good lid on it when he had to. He tamped it down. He waited for Brady to speak.

"I'll see you soon, buddy."

"Yeah you too, Brady. Stay off the crap, okay?"

"Nope, no crap for me. Starting now, I'm not taking any crap from anyone ever again. Take care of yourself."

Sam hung up and tossed his cell phone down on his too small mattress. He put his hands on his hips and gathered his thoughts. Maybe he'd push Brady to seek counseling when he got back. Sometimes he wished _he, himself,_ could seek counseling. But what the fuck would he tell them? He'd have to lie about everything from the beginning of his life to now. There was only one, maybe two, people on the planet who really _knew_ Sam Winchester.

Dean.

Dean knew him. Dean knew everything about him, just as he knew everything about Dean. It was nice at times, the shorthand they'd had between them. The easy familiar rhythm that made words unnecessary. Everything they meant to convey spoken with a raised eyebrow or a snort or a roll of the eyes. He and Brady were damned good friends, but they'd never achieved that level of intimacy. That sibling shorthand. Suddenly for the first time in a while, beneath all the hurt and anger, Sam truly, _deeply_ missed his brother.


	4. Chapter 4

_"Remember when I came back from break all messed up — dropped out of pre-med, the drugs, the bitches? That was the new Brady. That was me. Remember how much time you spent trying to get me back on the right track? You really were a good friend." -The Demon Brady 5.20 The Devil You Know_

The problem with Demons working together is the tendency to want to backstab one another to get ahead in whatever scheme they were planning. Team work never seemed to go very well when everyone had their own angle. Still, if there was a common goal in mind, it was easy enough to find loyal men to fill the ranks. Azazel chose one of those to infiltrate Tyson Brady.

Tyson would be so easy to use, really. The blue-blooded sack of shit was already falling apart under pressure. Sammy wouldn't suspect a damn thing if he started acting oddly.

No one would question his startling changes in behavior. College kids ended up on drugs all the time, because they apparently find it _so_ much pressure to study and show up to fucking class twice a week. Brady would just be another casualty. Shame, really. Such a bright young man.

Such a promising future.

And given Sam's pathetic boy scout conscientious nature, he was guaranteed to try and save Brady from himself. The Winchesters loved to do that. Save people. And Sam especially had a pull to want to save people from themselves. At least his fucking brother and father were smart enough to focus on a physical out come. They had the pay off of kill the monster, save the girl. Sam wanted to heal and mend and offer supporting shoulders to people...at least until it became obvious that it was futile. Then he would finally pull away out of self-preservation before the other person dragged him down with him. Like he'd done with his family.

It would make Sam so sad to fail at putting Brady back on the right path. It would make him so unhappy and powerless, like he'd been before he'd taken charge of his own life, told his father to fuck off, and gone off to college.

Somewhere deep down in his distorted soul, Azazel was happy.

* * *

Sam smiled as Brady knocked in his dorm room door and let himself in. Brady was wearing his loafers and a crisp Polo shirt, his hair combed back with styling gel. He looked markedly better than last time they'd been together.

"Hey Sam," the voice was jovial. "How was vacation? Or your idea of it?"

"Good." Sam said, standing up from his banged up little writing desk. A curbside find. It was close to a genuine antique, which meant that it was as solid as they come. It also meant that the chair was several sizes too small for Sam's tall ans still lanky frame, but most things were, and he knew how to make do. Sam had rescued it off a curb at the start of his school career and it had followed him since then.

He'd arduously carried it back to his room, cleaned it, glued what was rickety back together, and despite the wear and dents, he had a nice solid desk. It always amazed him what people threw away. What ended up in land fills on a whim. Good serviceable things that had just become old or out of style.

Sam took Brady's hand, pulled him into a rough hug and thumped him on the back. "You look good, man. You had me worried about you for a minute."

"Me?" Brady said breezily, "Nah."

Sam's forehead wrinkled. "You sure? You can talk to me, man. It's just us here."

"You know I..." Brady shifted with a smile and squared his shoulders. "I was just really stressed over school and family but I sort of came to an epiphany."

"Which is...?" Sam dragged out the syllables.

"Fuck 'em both."

Sam snorted with an uncomfortable smile. "Yeah... it's not always that simple though, is it?"

"Sure it is." Brady circled around him and straddled the antique chair and settled in. "My family...I don't need the stress, I gotta do what makes me happy, you know?"

"Yeah." Sam replied with the same unsure flash of teeth. "I've been telling you that for years. You always put so much pressure on yourself to-"

"So I told my father to bite me and rolled out of there." Brady traced his finger over the top of the curved wooden chair, an ornate swirl in the wood, crafted no doubt back before things were mass manufactured.

Sam's eyes widened. "You _what?"_

"He was on me about my grades...about making it through and staying on target, graduating when I was supposed to...blah, blah blah, I was done with his shit. I got to thinking maybe I don't want to be a doctor. I mean he's pushing me into it."

"But...but you love medicine."

"Other things to love about it besides working with patients, Sam. I was thinking research science. Pharmaceuticals. Hands on stuff. What do you think?"

Sam blinked, baffled by the change in behavior. "I..." he paused. "I mean it's good that you're not letting them stress you and push you, Brady, but I mean think about this. Really _think_ about it. You're several years into pre-med. That's...that's a lot of work to switch tracks with. And I know your family is stressful sometimes but I mean," he huffed, "all families are. They care about you. You can't just throw them away."

Brady raised an eyebrow. Hos look of disapproval was almost feral. "Really, Sam? You're going to tell _me_ that?"

Sam felt the jibe hit it's mark. His face tightened a little, a painful lump in his throat before he managed to swallow. "My family is dysfunctionally dangerous. It's... It's a different story altogether." Sam's jaw jumped a little. "And I didn't throw them away. They threw me away."

A flash of Dad's deep baritone. _If you leave, don't you ever come back._

John Winchester was a man of his word. There would be no going back. And when push came to shove, his brother had sided with their father. With what he saw as his duty and his legacy. _  
_

Sam could feel his heart give a decidedly strong thump in his chest. Could feel it speeding up, aided with adrenaline, his respiration quickening. He wasn't usually even aware of the amount of hurt and betrayal and abandonment boiling just below the surface, until something external scraped it on accident. Then it surprised him with its intensity, like a paper cut rubbed the wrong way.

Sam liked to qualify his emotions with logic but this...well, _this_ he doubted he would ever be over entirely.

Brady was watching his reaction with an almost measured distance that bordered on making Sam uncomfortable.

"You're right." Completely different, he acquiesced.

"And cutting them off. That's...you'll have to support yourself, man. Make your own way. Believe me, it's not always easy. It's a lot of work and..."

"Okay, Sam, I get it." Brady cut in, almost impatiently. "Hey. I am going to a party tonight. You wanna come?"

Sam felt himself shrink back uncomfortably. He turned his head. "You know I'm no good at parties."

"Come on." Brady rapped his knuckles on the wooden chair back a few times. "Live a little. Get away from this Two-Dollar-Little-House-on-the-Prairie Writing Desk and come have a drink with your buddies. If it's lame we can all dodge out the back door and go grab something to eat."

"All?"

"Zach and Rebecca are coming too. Come on." Brady stood up and shoved the chair noisily across the wooden dorm room floor.

Sam could see it scuff the old laminate. He winced. "Careful don't scrape the floor."

"Are you shitting me? Like these bastards can't afford to refinish the floors once a freaking decade. They'll probably cover em up with crappy carpet someday anyway."

Sam's brow furrowed, a little thrown by Brady's change of behavior. "Brady what are you _on_?"

"Nothing buddy." He seemed taller than he usually did. More confident, a big broad shouldered, chisel-jawed athlete of a man. Someone that belonged in a frat playing beer pong. "I'm on LIFE, man. You should try it."

He clapped Sam roughly on the back.

Sam fought the unease in his stomach. He wasn't comfortable with Brady's new found attitude...at all.

* * *

Tyson Brady was a weird fit at first. It had been so long since the demon had tried on a meatsuit. As meatsuits went, this one was pretty nice. The kid was athletic, good looking, charming, rich. It was a welcome assignment.

Tyson had been so easy to possess. No fight at all. The kid was too damn tired and stressed. When The Demon first entered Brady's mind, set up shop and took a look around, he almost laughed at Brady's worries.

 _Were his grades good enough? Would his parents be angry?_ Petty moral dilemmas. _Was he nice enough to the girl friend he'd broken up with a few months ago? Was it his fault the relationship didn't work out?_

The boy had guilt over angry words or skipped assignments or petty lies. All this inconsequential human baggage inside this soft mind. No steel in this kid's spine at all. He was so fucking wishy washy. So _afraid_ of offending or doing the wrong thing.

Pathetic. Fucking Pathetic.

The Demon let Brady have the reins here and there. He let Brady know there was something wrong with him. Pushed the kid's consciousness out of the way but made sure that it was not so thorough a job that the kid wasn't _aware_ something was wrong with himself. Then, when he'd given Brady control of his own body again, the kid had come back to consciousness with a rush of sheer panic.

He called Sam and cried while The Demon sat back and observed his distress with detached amusement. The Demon tested the waters, taking over the kid's thoughts for a moment. Fencing with Sam on the phone, then hanging up. He'd told Brady's parents to fuck off and left home early.

Then, he took the new body for a spin. He'd taken his time, weaved his way back to Stanford slowly. Taking the opportunity to smell the roses, to indulge in some reckless drinking and driving. He scored a few drugs on his way back to school and took Brady's body for a test ride with a cheap hooker.

It was good to be back topside. So _good_ to feel the adrenaline and life force surging in his veins again, singing to him with its sheer intensity. To feel the heady feeling of sex and power. And all the while to feel Tyson's loud distress in the back of his mind as he watched with horror, imprisoned in his own psyche horrified by the behavior and foreign thoughts running through his brain.

That was just the fucking cherry on the sundae.

The demon would never let the boy know that he was possessed. He'd play his cards carefully. Taking over when he felt like it, which to be honest was probably most of the time, maybe letting Brady have the reins now and again just for fun because nothing felt quite so pleasurable as the distress and anxiety and angst that came pouring off a body you inhabited when they knew something was wrong.

It had been too long since The Demon had felt real enjoyment...dare he even say... _fun._

 _ **Author's note: I started this a while ago when season 12 started and sat back to watch the writers wreck canon and screw over plot lines from the Kripke Seasons. As such, this follows purely 1-5 canon. Sam is the ONLY true vessel of Lucifer. The ONLY one who can contain him, regardless of magic and meddling and Crowley or Rowena or Harry Potter spells or whatever else the writers come up with. Just a heads up as I progress, that this is 1-5 canon compliant. I refuse to acknowledge the mess they've made this season pandering to fan girls. Thanks guys, drop me a review if you like.** _


	5. Chapter 5

Hey Sam," Brady called, wandering over to the young Winchester, holding two bottles of Sierra Nevada by the neck in one hand. Funny thing about these ivy leaguers, even when they were slumming, they did it with class. No crushed cans of Budweiser or watered down piss here.

Sam's attempt to be invisible appeared to be conversely making him quite noticeable as he stood uncomfortably away from the gaggle of people like a sick calf in a herd of buffalo. The Demon who now thought of himself as "Brady" wondered if the kid was aware of it. "You trying to blend in with the wallpaper?" He asked mockingly.

"Huh?" Sam had his arms crossed protectively and had been leaning his shoulder against the apartment wall. He looked behind him and seemed to take in the old-fashioned floral pattern as if seeing it for the first time. "Oh. Yeah."

"Sammy... Giving new meaning to the word _wallflower._ " Brady smiled widely.

Sam's eyes flashed a little guardedly.

The demon watched with interest...what was this? A sore spot. What had he just hit on accident?

"It's Sam." Sam said firmly and actually with a bit of authority that the Demon had never seen from him. There it was. The bit of steel behind that soft exterior. That bit they needed. "You know I hate it when people call me that."

Ah... So that was it. Family issues. Sammy. The name reminded him of dear old Daddy, perhaps. Or maybe Dean.

Dean was a deep wound with this one. Well, to be honest, both his brother and his father were. Sam was fine on the surface. Thriving, in fact, but down below the skin, they were lurking there like an old healed over war wound. One not visible but something that would never, never heal properly.

Brady shook his head with a snort and smiled, white teeth and a dimple. He handed Sam the second bottle of Sierra Nevada as a peace offering. "You really shouldn't hate it. It fits you well."

"It really doesn't." Sam protested stubbornly, but he took the bottle. He employed the bottom edge of his Guns N Roses t-shirt as a buffer and used it to twist the cap off with his hand. Sam looked around for a waste bin, didn't see one, kept a hold of the cap in the same palm that the cold, sweating glass bottle was in.

"Okay okay." Brady said, swinging own bottle around with his hand gesture. "You win. Now are you gonna mingle?"

He saw Sam's gaze sweep the room. "I don't know most of these people."

"Duh... Party." Brady rolled his eyes. "That's how you meet people. You walk over to someone you know and they introduce you to their friends and then you become friends with your friend's friends. It's called networking."

Sam snorted. "That's a lot of friends."

"Never too many." Demon Brady said breezily.

Sam raised an eyebrow. "Wow. You really have turned over a new leaf. You weren't too much better at this stuff than I was."

"I'm improving, Sam." Brady put his arm around him heavily. He dragged Sam sideways a little with his weight, purposefully acting more inebriated than he was. "Wanna ditch this place and get some air?"

"Yeah. Yeah I do." Sam agreed.

They headed out the door unnoticed and Brady could see Sam visibly relax as they stepped out into the beautiful Palo Alto night. There was a little nip to the air, but nothing more severe than a warm spring night in New York.

Sam looked up at the sky. "You know," he said. "It's so weird, cause the weather here feels like I'm on a perpetual vacation."

"Yeah?" Brady asked curiously.

"Well, here it is December and we're in t-shirts. I..." he cast around for words, almost as if he were choosing what to reveal. "We moved around a lot. But mostly it seemed to be a lot of little old towns in the rust belt or the Northwest. I don't know. Just...I'm used to cold and snow."

Brady looked at him sharply. "You don't trust the sun do you?"

Sam seemed to catch the entendre. He looked back, his eyes dark in the dim light. "I wouldn't say that." He took a sip of his beer, and snorted after a minute. "Okay. Yeah maybe. Maybe I don't trust it."

"Good things happen sometimes, Sam." Brady said.

The skeptical look was still in the soft eyes for for a moment. "I guess. I guess they do... Sometimes." He took another sip of his beer. "How are things with you, Tyson?"

The demon smiled. "I'm...I'm okay." He tilted his head. "Hey what are you doing about winter break? I know you can't stay on campus."

Sam ran a hand through his soft bangs. "No. I can't. I'm... I don't know, I was thinking I'd find a temp job and maybe just rent a room somewhere. I'm having a hard time finding anything though. There's always the YMCA or something."

Brady's look was bordering on disgust. "You're gonna stay at the Y? Sam, come on!"

Sam shrugged. "I'll stay wherever I can get always roof I can afford. Zach and Rebecca were sort of hinting that I could stay with them in Boston for the winter but..." he broke off and looked sideways. "I don't want to intrude."

Oh that damn Winchester Pride. Afraid to ask for a handout. Afraid to accept help. Not afraid perhaps, just stubbornly _opposed_ to doing it. He'd rather sleep on a park bench then go live in a freaking mansion with his best friends if it meant keeping his pride intact.

The Demon almost felt some sort of sympathy for him. It was mixed with disgust at the kid's stupidity. How much harder did Sam have to make his _own_ life by his choices? With a face like that, an intellect like he had, all fiery passion- Sam Winchester could have scammed his way through life with a bare minimum of effort. He could be in every woman's bed on or off campus. He could con his way into any job, circumvent the system-make it work for him.

But no. He chose the righteous path.

The path that led right through the weeds and thorny bushes that caught at his clothes as he passed. A path that would make him bleed from the thorns...one that could _not_ lead to anything _but_ him bleeding from his unnecessary sacrifices. All of them for no reason. For no reason other than some misguided sense of morality. Of wanting to do the right thing. Wanting to be a good person. So much irony that the true vessel of the Devil was literally hell bent on being a saint.

It was going to be so beautiful to break Sam down. To twist that brightly shining soul into something unnatural. Into something hard and manipulative. Into something like, well like Azazel. How utterly incredible that would be... Sam would be powerful and cunning. All that intellect combined with his sheer strength and unbending will would made him perfect to lead. And later still, a perfect vessel once Lucifer was freed. Then Sam Winchester would be gone of course, and only that tall vessel inhabited by the Light Bringer would remain. But most of the fun was going to be on the road to make that happen.

"Well I was thinking," Brady said slowly, drawing out the syllables. "That since I'm not going back to my parents this break, we could rent a place off campus together."

Sam looked a bit crestfallen. "You aren't at all? Not even for Christmas?"

"Nope." Brady replied with a sip of his beer. "Fuck them."

Sam kept the disappointed look.

"Sam, come on. You, of all people, should know what I'm taking about."

"I do." Sam said, scuffing the sidewalk with his shoe. "But... Brady. I... you should be with your family for the holidays, man."

"Sam, the discussion is closed."

Brady saw Sam's jaw go tight and a little defiant light flicker in those mercurial eyes, but then he sipped his beer to cover the temper and he was back to being soft Sam again. "There's no apartments to be found right now. Not within a ways of here. Most people don't want to do the couple months with no lease thing."

Brady rolled his shoulder. "You know my parents. I can hook us up. You in or out?"

Sam drained the last of the beer. "In," he said, tossing the cap on the ground where it bounced before it landed in the grass.

tbc...


	6. Chapter 6

Sam grunted as he shoved his writing desk into a corner of his bedroom. Brady's connections had turned up a nice little apartment that was more like half a house on a suburban street. The apartment came furnished. Sam had never actually lived in a place this nice before with furniture this tasteful. He was used to crappy motel rooms with shag carpet from the sixties. Old chairs with the stuffing torn out. Or maybe the occasional space they broke into and squatted at for a few months. Bobby Singer's place was the closest to a proper home. Cluttered and dusty, smells of musty books and booze. But this place was clean and new and decorated with a careful eye.

Brady watched him work for a second before he entered and gave a scoffing laugh. "Sam... What are you insisting on bringing that monstrosity in here for?" He asked, eyeing the old ornate desk with distaste as if it may turn hostile at any moment.

Sam adjusted the desk drawers and shrugged. "I dunno. It just makes me feel settled in. Like this is home. I left all my other stuff in my dorm except for my clothes."

Brady eyed the scruffy t-shirt and threadbare jeans. "Should've left those too."

Sam looked taken aback and hurt shone on his features briefly before he ducked his head and gave a little huff through his nose.

Brady observed the flash of insecurity. -Realized that Sammy used that mop of bangs to hide under when he felt vulnerable. The kid was aware that he didn't fit in deep down. He tried to. He wanted to. He wanted to belong _so_ badly that Brady could taste it off him in an aura of desperation. But he never would. These people were white collar and Sam Winchester-no matter how much he wanted to leave behind his roots-Sam was the son of a mechanic. The son of a blue-collar work like a dog Marine. And he would _always_ be that no matter how much spit shine and polish you put on the boy.

The Demon loved that. Loved that Sam would always feel different. Always feel "other."

Sam recovered himself after a few moments of being stunned by Brady's remark "Well they tend to frown on people being naked on the streets in Palo Alto so bringing my clothes seemed to be the only viable choice."

The Demon smiled. _Good. Deflect. Make it into a joke. Don't confront the hurt._ Demon Brady was certain Sam had learned that coping technique from his brother.

Brady slapped him on the back in a friendly camaraderie. "Oh I don't know. There's some women around here that wouldn't mind that from you, I think." Brady paused. "Possibly a few men."

Sam flushed and shook his head. "Yeah, right."

Brady raised an eyebrow. "You are clueless, aren't you? Just completely clueless."

Sam scoffed and moved away to shove the chair he'd brought in under the desk.

"You didn't see the way the land lady was eyeing you like a wolf this morning?" Brady pressed.

Sam looked up. "What? No."

Brady shook his head, threw up his hands in a gesture of _I give up_. "Okay. Live in your denial. Rent space there."

Sam shook his head. "Can't afford to...this place cleaned me out."

"Hey, I told you I'd pay."

"Equal footing or I'm not moving in." Sam said firmly. "We've been over this."

"Okay, okay." Brady gave a long suffering sigh. "You like to make everything so much harder than it has to be."

Sam watched him for a second. "My brother says that."

"Well, he's right."

Sam's eyes fixed on a nail hole in the wall. Brady watched a reflective silence overtake the young man for a moment. He missed his brother. It showed.

"I want to do things right." Sam said, finally. "That's not making things harder: it's making them right."

Brady snorted. "By making them harder. The right path is _always_ the harder one, Sam. Trust me on this." That was The Demon speaking his own centuries of wisdom, stating the unequivocal truth.

Sam's eyes slid over to him. He shrugged, a slight raise of his shoulder and then a drop. "It's how I'm built."

Brady cocked his eyebrow. "What do you get out of it?" He asked with genuine curiosity.

Sam's eyes widened just a little with his startlement. "My pride. My... soul intact."

"It's much harder for just a bit of pride. I'm learning that myself."

The Demon could hear Tyson Brady, the _actual_ Tyson Brady, wailing in the background, imprisoned in his own psyche. Confused. Longing for family. At this point the confusion of his gentle soul locked inside this meatsuit was like white noise. Just static in the distance. The demon hadn't calculated how much longer he needed Tyson Brady in here sharing space.

This meatsuit was a long term assignment. This wasn't a quick possession, a convenient host, and then a hasty departure. No. The Demon meant to set up shop here. He meant to make this space his home. Eventually he would actually _be_ Tyson Brady. And Sam's young friend would be smothered like an ailing grandmother with a pillow. But not yet. The demon intended to withdraw the reins soon and give Tyson a glimpse into what he'd become. Sam would respond to his friend's distress. He would not be able to _resist_ the call to help. Certainly the demon could fake that distress to ensnare Sam, but no, sitting back and watching how upset Tyson was would be watching a gorgeous piece of performance art. Human suffering was so beautiful. And beautiful humans like Sam and Tyson suffered so beautifully.


	7. Chapter 7

Throughout his years Sam had developed a 'live and let live' philosophy. He'd had to in order to cope with Dean's behavior. His brother constantly did something Sam secretly disapproved of: mouthing off to authority. Drinking. Skipping school. Fighting. Women. Sam usually gave a world weary eye roll and then helped his brother cover up whatever he'd been doing when their father came home. His loyalty to his brother always made him complicit in some crime.

As such Sam tolerated most of Brady's behavior over the break. Booze, women-even the occasional drug use. It was nothing he hadn't encountered before with his big brother.

Sam gently tried to steer Brady back onto the right path when the opportunity presented itself. But other than that, he kept his mouth shut and suffered through it with his usual quiet disapproval.

However, Brady's behavior was different than Dean's in a subtle way. Less bon vivant, more pathological somehow. It was also different than his father's liberal use of alcohol to drown his pain. It wasn't a sad world weariness that drove Brady...it was...Sam didn't know _what_ it was. Brady almost seemed high on his new found power to not follow the plans laid out for him, as if he was heady on his ability to step off the path.

Sam understood that a little. His departure to Stanford and out of the sheer dysfunction that drove his family had been a relief at first, like throwing off a fifty pound back pack.

The rain had picked up outside the window.

Sam poured himself some coffee.

Brady wandered into the kitchen in disarray. "What time is it?"

Sam looked at him. "I don't know. Noon?" He bit into a bagel he'd toasted.

"Noon? Why are you getting up at noon you lazy ass?" Brady quipped, heading for the coffee. "I mean I was up with a couple bimbos all night, but what is your excuse? Snuggling with a physics book?"

Some days he sounded just like Dean.

Sam shrugged. "Holidays make me unsettled."

Brady tipped his head. "That's right! It's Christmas Eve, isn't it?"

"Yeah," Sam said. "You should go home to your parents."

Brady looked at him and took a sip of coffee. "Yeah, that's taking a stand."

"You already took a stand. Go home. They love you. They'll forgive you." Sam shifted as he took a seat at the table and set his bagel down on the Corelle wear plate.

"What if I don't want forgiveness, Sam. What if I just don't want to be fucking suffocated with their plans for me?"

Sam closed his eyes and shrugged. "It's your life man."

Brady studied Sam. "Why don't you go home?"

"I can't. There's no home to go to."

"Well you're wandering around bleeding for your family like Little Orphan Annie. You might as well go."

Sam set his coffee spoon down. His brow wrinkled and he curled his lip up defensively. _Why did Brady keep bringing up this fucking issue?_ "Since when has me and my family been such a big concern for you, huh? You're pushing and pushing." He felt affronted. He wasn't sure why. He guessed because Brady assumed that he had normal family dynamics to go home to...like his own. He should fucking know better by now.

Sam had never revealed the truth of what they did, but Brady damn well knew that Sam didn't come from the kind of past Brady and their friends did. Truth was, Sam _was_ bothered by Brady's attempt to sever ties with his own family. They were good people, and though they may have pushed their son a little, they were pushing him to do his best. It had been with love.

There was some part of his consciousness that said in a small voice: _Dad pushed out of love._ Sam quashed it down without giving himself time to ponder it. He sensed that was a concept that would shake the very foundation he'd so painstakingly constructed. _Push forward. Leave the past._ It was the only way to get through it without wanting to die.

"I'm pushing you because you're pushing me."

"Because you HAVE a place to go back to, Brady."

"Maybe I don't _want_ to go back there. Ever think of that."

"Why?" Sam's expressive brow furrowed. "You love your family."

"And you don't love yours?"

Sam felt that like a knife. His heart gave a painful little twist. "That's not fair." He said softly. "You know I do."

Sam picked up his half-eaten plate of bagel and headed to the sink, his appetite gone completely. He'd always been a little bit of a fussy eater. Not fussy per se, since he usually had to eat what was on hand. But he'd never consumed much of it for his height and he was put off his appetite fairly easily it seemed. When he'd been with Dean and Dad, it had been often that he'd wanted to turn his nose up at mac and cheese or KFC. During his youth, if it was merely him and his brother, he would refuse to eat and let Dean polish off whatever he had left. If Dad were around he usually forced himself to finish his plate out of fear of the repercussions if he wasted food because it wasn't always easy to come by. He knew that. Dad did what he could to make sure they were fed and clothed but it was hard on him. A thankless job with no monetary reward. Not the wisest way to raise children.

Sam dumped the plate in the sink.

Brady cocked an eyebrow. "Really? You're not finishing your breakfast now?"

Sam whirled around on him, actually pissed. "You know what Brady? Back the hell off."

Was this their first fight? Seemed to be heading down that path. If it were he and Dean there'd be fists involved shortly. He was surprised that he almost wanted to pound the crap out of his friend for taking a charmed life and pissing on it and then lighting it on fire.

Brady gave a little smirk and settled back at the table. "Or what, Sam? You're gonna punch me? You gonna storm off like you do anytime something gets tough?"

Sam's nose wrinkled. "How the hell do you know what I do when things get tough?"

"You're about to do it, aren't you?"

Truth be told, he was. And now Brady's accusation was forcing his hand and going to make him stick here where he didn't want to be.

"What the hell is going on with you man? You're like a different person lately." Sam wrinkled his nose and turned to look at him.

Brady sat smugly. So far from being rattled by their conflict that it took Sam aback.

Brady didn't like discord. He was a sweet, easy going guy. To be unaffected by it like he seemingly was at the moment was so out of character that Sam wasn't sure how to react.

At all.

"I told you, Sam. I had an epiphany. I'm not a door mat anymore. You should try it."

"That's bullcrap! You weren't a fucking doormat. You were a good person. You made good choices."

"I made a choice to be pushed around and taken advantage of. I made a choice to be eaten up by the system. I made a choice to worry all the time about everyone but me." Brady paused. He seemed like he was accessing some memory or something he'd stored up recently. "You remember _Trainspotting?"_

Sam paused. "The...movie?"

"Yeah. The movie." Brady replied with an eye roll.

"Well there was a book too. Irvine Welsh."

Brady waved the tidbit off. "Okay nerd. The speech. _Choose a job, choose a career. Chose life. I chose not to choose life. I chose something else. Well, I'm choosing something else."_

Sam squared up with Brady's recumbent figure, the indignant bafflement on his features obvious. "He chose fucking _heroin_ , Brady!"

"Your point?"

"That's not a viable option!"

Brady didn't respond to his anger with his own. He shrugged his shoulders. "I just suddenly see through the bullshit we are all caught up in."

Sam snorted. "I can't believe I'm having this conversation with you."

"Something more than abject philosophical debates, you mean? Something REAL?"

Now that actually sounded a little more like Brady's usual level of intellect.

Sam was trying to figure out how deeply he wanted to wade into the water in this debate. _Fuck it. Lay it all out on the table._

"You wanna be real? Let's get real. You had a great life. Yes you worked hard but you had opportunities given to you, Tyson. A lot of them. And you recognized that. I know you were stressed this semester..." Sam paused, could see Brady's worn features in his minds eye. "But... you were working toward something great. And that takes a toll and sacrifices sometimes. You knew that. You were gonna push through and then all the sudden you just burned the bridge."

"I didn't burn it." Brady said. "I napalmed that fucker."

"Yes! You did!" Sam ran a hand through his hair, his distress apparent. "Why?"

"Because if you leave a bridge there you're tempted to cross back over. Maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow, but It will always be in the back of your mind that you can go back. If you leave it burning, you _can_ put out the fire. If you _detonate_ it, you've chosen your new path and you're set on that for better or worse, Sam." Brady looked smooth, passionate, like he had his life together.

"You..." Sam was at a loss as to what to say. There was a certain fucked up logic to the whole thing. And he saw echoes of himself and his father in it. His dad napalmed their bridge the minute Sam chose Stanford. And so this was the path he was on for better or worse. No going back. No going back.

"The other path was a good path, Brady. With good things."

"This had good things on the path." He raised his eyebrow and smiled wickedly. "Trust me."

"Binge drinking and women and drugs are not good things. Those are things people use as as a stop gap when they are suffering. And don't pretend I haven't noticed."

Brady shook his head slowly. His cat eating the cream look still there. "I am not suffering. I am enjoying my life."

He looked so earnest Sam almost believed him.

"You're the one suffering." Brady replied.

"What?" Sam scoffed with a little disbelieving huff through his nose.

"You're the one out of place and struggling."

"I'm home here." Sam said.

"Sure you are." Brady nodded his head in the direction of Sam's room. "You're that old writing desk in the middle of a post-modern mansion."

That hurt again. Really hurt. Sam felt his eyes well reflexively before he channeled it into ire. "Why..." he turned around and put his hand on the cupboard, leaned on it for a minute, the turned back around. "Why the hell are you trying to make me feel lesser? When I first got here, _you_ were the one who reached out to me. You were the one to include me. And now I'm just some...outcast, some scruffy..." he paused, at a loss for words.

"...Looking nerf herder?" Brady quipped and the humor was so Dean, Sam almost wanted to cry for that alone.

"Sam, I'm not trying to hurt you. I'm trying to show you I'm okay man. I'm right where I need to be."

"This is gonna spin out on you. It always does."

"Well that's life, huh?" Brady asked philosophically. "You think you got it all together and some bitch nail has to puncture your tire and send you into a spin out."

Sam took a breath. "Yeah."

There was a long pause. "Brady don't self destruct, okay. I don't wanna. I don't wanna watch it."

Brady nodded. Stood up and clapped Sam on the back. "Friends?" He asked.

"Yeah." Sam replied, looking at him.

In that moment Brady did seem so confident and smooth and together that it made Sam question his perception of reality. Maybe _he_ was the one headed for the nail in the road.


	8. Chapter 8

Christmas came and almost went and Sam wouldn't have acknowledged it, or remembered really, except for the fact that nothing was open and that included his jobs at the the local bookstore and the part time thing he had going on as a grunt for a local landscaping contractor. It was under the table and hourly. Not stable work by any means, but a good way to pick up fifty bucks here and there without having to pay taxes on it. Dad's warnings about leaving a paper trail still stuck in his head somehow, even though he damn well had a paper trail now that he was enrolled on full scholarship in an Ivy League Institution. Although the scholarship was on his _father's_ social security number...to the best of his knowledge Sam didn't have a real one. He'd slipped through the system. He supposed he'd have to rectify that one day.

And if he followed his path to become a lawyer, well...he really would have to apply for a social security number and he'd be pretty damned easy to find.

Brady was home that night, coming in from wherever he'd been. "Hey Sam."

He tossed him a beer from the fridge. Sam caught it reflexively without looking up from his book on the couch.

"Hey," Sam said in greeting.

"Merry Christmas. That's my gift for you."

Sam snort laughed. "Thanks."

The little shitty lamp he had on the table flickered. Sam flicked it with his finger. "I think your gift should be new wiring."

"This apartment isn't that freaking old. How about a bulb that didn't come from the dollar store?"

"Yeah that'd help too," Sam admitted.

"Come on," Brady said, holding up a stack of casino cards. "Christmas Poker. What do you say?"

Sam laughed and shut his book. "What are we betting?"

"Who has to clean the bathroom the next 3 weeks."

Sam raised an eyebrow. "Wait...Someone cleans the bathroom?"

Brady leveled a finger at him in response. "Exactly!"

Sam followed Brady in to the kitchen, settled in on the wooden chair and took a sip of his beer as his friend shuffled.

"You know," Sam said conversationally, "those used to be used as tarot cards years ago. There's a whole occult symbolism behind them."

"Someday you have to tell me how you know all this weird shit." Brady replied.

Sam shrugged. "Just a hobby."

"Useless Occult Info 101. Yes, I know." Brady tossed a card randomly face up on the table. "Ten of Spades. There. What's that mean.?"

"You're supposed to set out three for a reading." Sam set down his beer.

Brady tossed two more. The Three of Spades and the Five of Clubs.

Sam raised an eyebrow and looked them over. "Well Spades correlate to Swords and Clubs are Wands..." he trailed off, "which... so yeah, this reading basically sucks." He fingered the three. "The tarot card for this is a heart pierced by three swords. Loneliness and separation from loved ones." Sam turned the ten around. "This one is a dead man stabbed in the back by ten swords."

Brady snorted. "Okay. Violent. You gonna be mass murdered?"

"It means a really hard hit. Betrayal by someone you love, feeling backstabbed or just a really bad time-destruction of hopes and dreams. And the Clubs there means struggle and competition."

Brady laughed. "Well good thing these things are full of shit."

"Yeah." Sam said. "Good thing because otherwise one of us is in for some heavy crap."

Brady shuffled the cards back in and eyed Sam carefully. "You don't actually believe in this shit do you?"

Sam felt the scrutiny from the blue eyes and shrugged, dropped his gaze to the cards as Brady dealt the hand.

"I don't discount stuff," he said slowly, as if choosing his words with care.

"I thought you were more scientific than that." The tone had a slight accusation to it.

"The two can coexist," Sam said glancing at his hand. It was a mess. No matching suits, no runs of numbers. A mishmash of useless cards. "Maybe."

"Yeah, about as easily as a woman can be both a virgin and a slut."

Sam looked up at the phrase and huffed. "All women were virgins once. Even the sluts."

 _Even Dean,_ he thought to himself wryly.

Brady sipped his beer again. "Speaking of virgins, when you gonna find a girlfriend?"

Sam smiled shyly, his dimples showing. "When I get time. I don't have time for a relationship right now."

"So when you graduate."

Sam shook his head. "Just play the game."

Several rounds of poker turned into them drunk and betting random things that held no value whatsoever. Like Sam's sneakers or a losing lotto ticket that Brady had in his pocket. Then poker devolved rather unexpectedly into a drunken, cutthroat game of Go Fish.

It was a good Christmas.

The best Sam could remember in a long while.

* * *

New Year's came and went quietly.

Well, not quietly in Brady's world.

He was out partying, Sam was certain. But Sam wasn't.

Sam's other friends were all back home with their families. At least work had been opened for part of the day, so he'd had something to set his mind on. He'd stayed out as long as he could before heading back to an empty apartment. He tossed his keys on the table and came in, cracked himself open a beer, and sat on the sofa with his feet propped on the coffee table.

He thought of Dean. Dean was like the refrain to a song that he couldn't get out of his head. One that popped in all loud with the chorus at each silent moment.

They hadn't really talked in so long now. So long, that despite the fact that Sam wasn't really mad at him anymore, there was an awkward distance between them that he didn't know how to breech. Or even if he should.

Maybe Dad and Dean were better off without him?

The last few years of his adolescence he'd been a constant source of friction for Dad...calling him out for every shitty behavior the boys had let slide throughout their childhood. Dad met the accusations with anger and indignance. Dean with annoyance that Sam couldn't just let it be.

Sam had called Dean "an enabler" at some point and Dean had called Sam an asshole. Maybe he was. Maybe they were better off with him away.

He had the briefly melodramatic thought that maybe everyone was better off without him. Maybe it wasn't _them,_ maybe it was _him._ Something wrong with _Sam_ _Winchester._ Something tainted and broken and awful. _  
_

Sam shook his head to clear it. No. He knew better than to follow that line of reasoning. Those thoughts led nowhere. Nowhere good at all. Still, sometimes he wished he had at least one person who understood him. That used to be Brady, but not anymore it seemed.

His text went off and Sam flipped the phone open. It was from Rebecca. _Happy new years! We love you xoxo._

Sam smiled. Women he liked; he understood.

They communicated vastly different than men. The Language of Men, of course, had been the only language Sam had grown up with: Dad's taciturn moods, Dean's rough teasing, Bobby's hard bitten rebukes that spoke of love underneath.

But since escaping to Stanford, he'd found women just _said_ things. They just said "I love you," instead of a rough slap on the back or a noogie that communicated the same thing.

They weren't afraid to confront issues and just talk about them.

There were hugs and words of encouragement and "I love yous...and xoxos." Despite what he'd said to Brady about not caring about being in a relationship...he really wanted to be in one. A month or two long hook up like he'd had here and there wasn't what he needed. He needed a girl who wanted to stick. Wanted to stick with Sam Winchester. One who understood his flaws and held him while his wounds bled.

He wondered if, at its core, that's what having a mom was like. Then he decided that that was way too Oedipal and dropped the line of thought.

 _Happy New Years! Miss you._ Sam sent back.

He bit his lip and leaned back against the couch. He should find something to do. Boredom was his enemy. It made his analytic mind start whirling and remembering and picking apart all the trauma from his past. And that never led anywhere good.

He went for his usual method to keep his internal monsters at bay.

Sam got up, cracked open one of his law textbooks and started reading. He was doing that well past when the clock struck midnight.

Brady never came home.

 **Please drop a review. Thanks for the encouragement.**


	9. Chapter 9

Sam switched shoulders with his back pack. It was a particularly nippy night and he had his old lightweight beige carhart jacket on. Even after all this time, the canvas held traces of smoke from bars he'd been in, oil from cleaning weapons and standing around talking to Dean, while his brother leaned over Baby's hood and tinkered with some component of her that Sam didn't understand and made it a point to not want to. He got a flash of Dean's face, cheek smeared with grease, wiping his brow with his filthy oil rag, thus making it worse, smiling at Sam's protest.

Sam dropped his gaze to the sidewalk as he strode and tried not to think of his brother. Often he was successful, but just as often it seemed that Dean strode through whatever cracks were in Sam's psyche like a dandelion growing from concrete.

Sam noticed suddenly how conspicuously absent any weeds were in the Palo Alto sidewalk. In the climates with harsher weather, the ground itself shifted like a sleeping dragon as it froze and unfroze, and the concrete, inflexible as it was and worn down by salt and snow and plows- cracked at the stress points. Eroded where it had had too much rock salt hit it. And then in spring, some intrepid and hardly little plant sought solace in the tiny opening of concrete and nestled in the soil. It found a space there, moist and blocked from the wind, and grew. And grew... and tore its host apart more.

Sam always found it strangely beautiful that nature reclaimed it's space in the parts of suburbia that were ignored. But here, without the harshness of the environment, in the carefully maintained and controlled spaces of the semi-wealthy, nothing grew wild. All was order.

Sam had the weird thought that here nothing like _Dean_ could grow. Dean was shaped by hardship and extremes of fortune. He rooted in what he could find and stayed there doggedly. Others didn't see the beauty of him. He disrupted their plan of homogeny, wild thing that he was. In the suburbs of Palo Alto a creature like Dean could not grow.

Sam paused, shifted His sack of books and wondered if he, himself, was the same way. Did the people here view him as a dandelion pushing through the cracks in the sidewalk? He scuffed a worn shoe over the concrete and kept walking, feeling strangely Other in this environment he'd sought out.

Sam's danger sense picked up that something was wrong before he even entered the apartment. It was a well-honed skill borne both of the supernatural and dodging his father's drunken tirades. He flipped on the light.

"Brady?" He called.

He heard a sobbing noise from the bedroom and hurried in, dropping his book bag on the floor.

"Brady?"

The door was ajar, giving him just a glimpse of Brady's room. He saw Brady huddled on the floor, back pressed against the drawers of his cherry wood dresser.

Sam pushed open the door and poked his head in. "Brady? What is it, man?"

Brady was in his boxer shorts and a white tank top. He looked up, flushed a little at his friend's presence. His eyes were red-rimmed and his nose pink. His gelled hair askew in wildly unkempt directions.

Sam took in the empty booze bottles, the open prescription bottle with pills scattered from it on the glass top of the dresser, as well as a few scores of powdered cocaine.

"Sam..." Tyson said softly.

Sam stepped in and crouched down. "Jesus, Brady what did you do, man?"

"I don't know..." Brady was shivering.

"Hey." Sam said softly. "Hey." He smoothly touched his friend's carotid artery. -Knew right where to check for a pulse from too many past experiences with his family.

The pulse was galloping. Triple timing. Sam counted the beats in his head.

"Alright Tyson, I'm gonna get you up, okay?"

Brady was silent.

"Okay?" Sam asked softly, brow furrowed in worry.

"Y..yeah." Came the whispered answer.

Sam took Brady by the arms and hauled him up. He guided him the two steps to the bed and sat him down.

He sat there for a moment, shaking.

Sam gazed at the mirrored dresser and righted the tipped pill bottle. "Oxycodone?" His hunter's instinct made him pocket a few of the pills without Brady noticing. "Seriously, Brady. Talk to me, what did you have? Oxy, booze, and is this... coke?"

Tyson shook his head to clear it, spacey and not fully in control of his body or thoughts. "Y..yeah?"

"How much did you have?" Sam started counting the remaining pills hurriedly, years of training teaching him to react on instinct. Triage the victim, manage the situation, plan a course of action. Move, move, move. Waste no time.

"I don't..." Brady was foggy.

"Ten of these are missing. Did you take all ten?"

"No...no."

"Did you drink all this liquor?"

"I don't..."

Sam turned to face him and grabbed Brady's arm. "Tyson," he said patiently but firmly. "I need to know what you took and how much. I need to move fast to get you to a hospital if you overdosed."

Brady's blue eyes lit with fear. "I don't know."

"Okay. I'm calling 911." Sam pulled out his cell phone and started to dial.

"911 Emergency."

"Hello... my name is Sam-" his reception began to go screwy and the voice on the other line cut out. "Hello?" Sam swore, tried dialing again and the cell went dead. "Dammit!"

He turned around. "Brady, stand up. We're going to the hospital."

"No, Sam." The voice was small and scared.

"We need your stomach pumped, okay?"

"No." Brady pawed at Sam's sleeve like a child. "Please. Sam..."

"Brady." Sam hauled him up and staggered with him to the bathroom. Brady was a big guy and even though Sam was taller, he was still a bit of a burden. Sam propped his friend against the faux marble vanity for a minute and then maneuvered them so that Brady was bent over the sink. Sam stuck his fingers down his friend's throat. Brady gagged and pushed him off, began to retch into the basin. He threw up mostly liquid.

Sam held him steady until the spasm was over. He reached over with his free hand, filled the tumbler with water and gave it to Brady. "Rinse."

Brady took mouthful and spit it back into the sink, clearing his throat after.

Sam ushered him back to the bed and tucked a blanket around the shuddering shoulders.

Sam fetched some more water. "Drink this." He held it up to Brady's shaking hand. "Slow and steady. Do we have a thermometer in the house?"

Brady shook his head. He was still trembling, although Sam was uncertain whether it was from nerves or the drugs.

"Okay." Sam said patiently, his voice soft and cajoling. "Hey, buddy. Stay calm."

He took his friend's pulse again and then looked at the dilated pupils. "Tell me what you're feeling."

Brady didn't seem like he had his thoughts together enough to speak.

"Keep drinking." Sam tilted the glass in Brady's hand up to the young man's lips.

Brady's throat worked as he swallowed a few long draughts.

"Okay," Sam got him back up. "One more time."

"No, Sam." He struggled against the firm hold.

"It's okay." Sam soothed, wrangling the shorter man into the bathroom. "You can do this."

Sam had to wrestle with an uncooperative victim to get his hand down his throat and Brady pulled away, then started to gag and spit up water again and again.

Sam held him up to keep him from face planting with the heaves. He turned on the sink to rinse away the vomit, ran his fingers under the stream quickly and then put his arm around Brady and returned him to bed.

"That's it. Not gonna do that anymore. I had to get that out of your stomach, buddy. I'm gonna get you more water and I want you to drink it."

"No." Brady's skin was pale and his eyes shadowed.

Sam locked gazes with him, still talking patiently and firmly. "Brady, you've been to med school. You know I have to dilute what's in your system. It will be okay."

Something about the words seemed to get through the confusion and he nodded and looked up at Sam. He looked more pathetic than Sam had ever seen him. His thick blonde hair was in no semblance of order, there were deep lines in his face from being stressed, despite his youth. His blue eyes were hollowed out and lost.

Sam realized he was losing his friend, maybe not to death, maybe not to overdose, but he was surely losing him. He was at a loss.

He concentrated on what he could fix. What he could deal with. "How many fingers am I holding up?"

"Two."

"Good. Tell me your name."

"Tyson Brady."

"What day is it?"

Brady furrowed his brow, that fine shake still running though the hands clenched in his lap. "I... Wednesday."

"Thursday," Sam said. "Six times six?"

"Thirty six." Brady looked up at him, his eyes suddenly a little clearer. "You're a good friend, Sam."

Sam waved it off. "Yeah I know. I'm getting you more water."

He returned a minute later with a glass. "Keep drinking. We're gonna flush this out of your system."

Brady looked at the proffered glass with a lack of interest.

Sam shoved it into his hand. "Drink. You've got to drink. Help your kidneys and liver filter this crap."

Brady did. His hand seemed slightly steadier and he looked very drained. They sat quietly for a long time, Brady drinking copious amounts of water that Sam kept throwing at him.

Brady had his back propped up against the oak headboard and he rubbed the bridge of his nose with a groan. "Sam, you're gonna drown me." He complained as he eyed the water on the nightstand.

"I think you're doing a good job of drowning yourself right now." Sam answered.

Brady stood up and Sam sprang to his own feet, hands out protectively as if he were trying to keep a toddler from taking a spill.

"Hey," Brady assured. "It's okay. I can pee."

He walked a fairly straight line to the toilet and partially closed the door. -Emerged a little later, having thrown water on his face and toweled it off. He staggered back to the bed and sat down.

"Headache." He said, clenching his teeth. He'd begun to look like he had his wits about him.

Sam crouched down beside his friend and put a hand on his leg. "I think you're going to live. You had me worried there for a minute." His brow furrowed. "You can talk to me." He urged. "What's going on with you, man?"

Brady shook his head and tried to dodge Sam's eyes. "I don't know. It's like...I'm, there are gaps in my memory." He had a fine tremble running through his leg again.

Sam patted it. "The drugs. The drinking. It affects memory."

"I don't know where I am or how I got there. I...I do things and it's like watching myself do them. I'm burning bridges. My dad doesn't want to speak to me."

"Hey." Sam said with a small smile. "I got ya there." He took a breath. "Sometimes when we don't want to follow the path our parents mapped out for us they don't know how to deal with it."

His own leg was starting to cramp from holding the crouch, so Sam stood up and stepped back to lean his ass on the large oak dresser. He folded his arms and sat expectantly.

"What if they don't talk to me again?"

"They'll talk to you again." Sam assured. "Family always does."

"Does it though?"

Sam's gaze turned inward and he thought of the little broken family he'd broken even further by walking out. Brady's family was nothing like his.

"Yes. It does. Eventually." He looked up. "Brady, your family is close. Call them up and apologize."

Brady swallowed hard. Put his head in his hands. "I'm tail spinning, Sam. I don't know how it got this way."

"Hey," Sam said firmly. "I'm here, man. I've got you. You know that. Let's get you help."

"There's no help."

"Of course there is. There's a ton of rehab centers and addiction counseling. We just have to talk to someone." Sam paused. "I'll help. You know I will."

Brady's brow was eloquent with defeat. His depression was palpable.

"Let's start small. Get some sleep. When you get up we'll get a good breakfast and talk about options. Okay?"

Brady nodded.

He let Sam guide him to lay down and throw a blanket over him.

The young Winchester shut off the light and walked out into the hallway.

Sam leaned up against the drywall and closed his eyes against a swell of emotion. He wrestled it down and headed to his own bedroom. In between the endless worrying about Brady, he thought of Dean.

 **Whew. Rough chapter to write. Thank you for the reviews! They are so appreciated.**


	10. Chapter 10

Sam didn't sleep that night. He wandered to the bathroom several times and glanced in at Brady's inert figure to make sure he was still breathing. He always was, even when Sam felt his heart give an adrenaline driven thump of fear when it seemed as if his friend was too still for too long, but then there would be a shift of blankets as the ribcage expanded to take in a breath and Sam would feel a flood of relief and wander back to his own room.

After one of his unscheduled Brady check-ins, Sam picked up his cell and looked at the time. 3:30 am.

He knew someone who awake at this hour. He flipped it open and scrolled to Dean's contact info. He typed a quick message:

 _'How are you.'_

Sam stared at the screen light in the darkness of his room and hovered his thumb over the send button. The cell phone cast a blue glow around the boyish features as he thought.

He went back and deleted letter by letter. He replaced it.

 _'I miss you.'_

He deleted it. Typed: ' _How...'_ then looked at the blinking cursor, feeling a knot form in his stomach.

Sam paused. What was he hoping to do? What kind of communication would this open?

Dean would reply 'fine.' _If_ he replied at all.

Where did he go from there?

If he talked to his brother, told him what was going on Dean would throw it in his face.

 _Told you they were douchebags. You wanted to leave and live in the real world. Can't say I didn't tell you._

But God he missed him sometimes.

Sam kept himself busy so that he didn't have much time to dwell on his past. He found it worked best that way. If he thought about it, thought about their father, their _life,_ a simmering anger at the injustice began to give off steam. It threatened Sam's equilibrium. Made his gentle nature want to war with something. It wasn't good for him.

Life was decidedly more...peaceful...without Dean. But sometimes there was a quip that came to mind or some humor he wanted to share and his brother wasn't there. Sometimes there was a problem he wanted to confide to his brother about, to get his half-assed wisdom or simply to hear his witty take on. -Even if it was a slap upside the back of the head and a teasing, " _Sammy quit worryin."_

Sometimes Dean had a way of grounding him because those half-assed Yoda philosophies actually had wisdom in them. And even when they didn't, sometimes he just missed Dean's voice.

 _How..._ glowed up at him.

 _How are you._

When what he really wanted to say was: _how am I supposed to do this on my own, Dean?_

 _How often do you think of me?_

 _How is Dad?_

 _How did it come to this._

 _How did I let this happen. How did you let this happen._

 _How come you don't call._

 _How do I talk to you._

 _How do I fix this? What if I don't want to?_

 _How long til I see you again?_

Instead simply: _'How are you.'_

Sam deleted the message and snapped the phone shut.

* * *

Brady was much better in the morning. A bit hung over acting, but himself. Sam poured a bit of cereal and offered it to him.

"No thanks." Brady's voice was rough.

Sam shrugged and poured some milk in the bowl, dug in with his spoon. He sat down across from Brady at the little wooden table.

Brady sat nursing his coffee.

"We need to talk," Sam said. "I mean I have to leave for work soon so maybe this isn't the best time but we need to get you some help. Last night can't happen again."

Brady kept his eyes trained on the coffee mug. "I'm fine, Sam."

"God dammit Brady!" Sam exclaimed, letting his spoon clatter against the ceramic bowl as he slammed it down. "I thought you were gonna die! That's not fine. That's not even remotely close to fine."

Brady looked up at him with lost eyes. "I don't feel like I know who I am anymore."

Sam studied him, still a little defensive. "I don't know what that means."

"I don't either." Brady replied without looking up. "I'm...I'm confused and losing time...and my memory is shot to hell."

"You're losing time because you're pounding alcohol and fucking Oxy. And coke. _Coke._ You need help." Sam's tone changed to sympathetic. "Let me help you. I..I'm can do research. We'll find you you a great rehab center. Your family can afford it."

Brady shook his head. "I can do this on my own."

"You can't do it on your own!" Sam countered. "You're over your head with this shit. Oxy has withdrawals, man. How long have you been taking it?"

He shrugged. "Since break?"

Sam breathed a sigh of relief. "Not too long then. There's hope, buddy. We can get you out of this."

"No getting out of this, Sam." His tone was defeated.

"Don't talk that way. I watched my dad live his life at the bottom of a bottle. He didn't have a choice. He had no support, no resources, no help. You do. You have a choice."

Brady looked contrite. "I..."

Sam glanced at the clock on his cell. "I gotta get to work. I will help you Brady. I will. You say the words and I am right here. But..." Sam leveled a look at him that Brady had never seen. Steel and determination. "I will _not_ let you pull me down with you. I cut ties with my family for being toxic. Don't think I won't do the same with you."

Sam slammed out.

 **Please drop me a review if you have the time. Poking away at this one, always nice to hear feedback. Thank you Michele, Sallyannerenee, WaitingforAslan, and Domino Darkwolf for replying last chapter or two. You keep me writing.**


	11. Chapter 11

Brady never did seek help. Sam tried to mother hen him into a rehab program or a psychiatrist and Brady alternately acted like he was going to give in and then resisted just when Sam thought he had gained ground. They still got along well for the most part. Brady was still fun and caring most days. Sam had to turn a blind eye to his debauchery that outstripped Dean's at times. And then break was over and Sam moved back into his dorm on campus and Brady kept the apartment.

* * *

The Demon inside Brady made himself more at home every day. Demons were particular about their meat suits and when you found one that fit...the way Tyson Brady fit, it was like an exquisite pair of custom loafers. And the more you broke them in, the more comfortable it got. Every nook and cranny, every corner of the kid's psyche, all the memories and moments, all accessible to the Demon.

He could flip through Brady's life like a highlight reel or stop and examine this Truth or that moment. He knew everything from Brady's first kiss to how he liked to jerk off. All his loves, his resentments, his complexities- a beautiful tome the demon could flip through at will. Sure, with Brady still inside it was a violation. A mind rape. But that added to the allure.

Each time the demon immersed himself in Brady's story and became more familiar with it, the more it became his own. He liked the way this boy fit him. The boyish, all American charm. The intellect. The wealth. The square jaw, blonde hair and blue eyes. The lady killer body. Tyson Brady had won the genetic lottery. The more times the demon saw himself in the mirror, those good looks and black eyes shining back at him, the more he enjoyed his vessel. The demon began to think of Brady's body as less of a body and as more of _HIM._

 _His_ place, the dwelling for _his_ soul. The demon knew in another life he'd called himself Belial. That was his true name. His demon name. He would always know that if he wanted to go back to it, but for now, for this long term assignment of however many years, Belial began to think of himself _as_ Tyson Brady. Like so many demons did once they got sentimental about their meat suit. He _was_ Tyson Brady. There was no evicting him out of here now.

* * *

Azazel trusted Belial as much as he trusted any demon...which is to say not completely. He remained reasonably certain that the lesser demon would carry out his plan correctly.

And it _had_ to be done correctly.

The Winchester had to be herded in the right direction, groomed the right way. Azazel did not want to lose him. The other special children he wouldn't have batted an eye at if he somehow botched the attempt. But that wasn't true of Sam.

Sam he would mourn.

But Sam wasn't strong enough yet. Not by a fucking long shot, Azazel knew this. He wondered how how much polishing Sammy would require. They'd lost ground with him at Stanford. Sure he was away from his overprotective paternal figure but he was also losing his edge.

He had already lost it in some ways. He'd adapted far better to civilian life than Azazel would have thought, being that Sam was not particularly mercurial. He wasn't like his brother. He wasn't eager to embrace new people and experiences. No. Sam Winchester was the nerd who kept his head down and didn't make trouble. Kept to himself.

But here... well he still wasn't popular by a long shot, but he hadn't turned into an isolated freak either. He had a small group of friends that seemed to think the world of him and that he in turn did anything for. That Winchester loyalty. That code he lived by.

So it was that Azazel decided to send one of his children to check up on his favorite little project and measure exactly how lax Sam had gotten.

* * *

Sam tilted his head and gave Brady an affable smile. "Look, she is cute. She really is."

Brady raised an eyebrow. "Why do I feel like this is going to be followed by a... but..."

"But I don't think she's interested, Brady."

"Sam." Brady shook his head. "Have you looked in a fucking mirror...like _ever?_ "

Sam exhaled though his nose and gave a little head shake, completely unaware that he looked like a poster of a teenage girl's wet dream when he did it. "Not every woman wants to sleep with me, Brady."

"Yeah," Brady responded. "Bullshit. You're just oblivious. That chick likes you."

Sam rolled his eyes heavenward and finished his beer. He kept a hold of the empty bottle and adjusted his stride to match his friend's. It was a decent night walking home from food and drinks and companionship. The loud raucous thumping of a sub woofer disturbed the peace and seemed to vibrate the ground as they drew nearer.

Brady looked toward the source of the disturbance, a frat house blasting music across the street. It was an old, elaborate Victorian type of thing. Actually a bit out of place with the rest of the Palo Alto architecture- giant Greek revival pillars, a big heavy wooden door thrown open to the street, people visibly milling in and out of the party.

"They could at least chose something better to play. I have half a mind to go in and try my hand as DJ." He turned an appraising look to Sam. "What do you say?"

He didn't know why he bothered to ask. Obviously Sam was going to turn the dare down. Like clockwork he did. "You know that's not my scene."

"Dammit Sam. What IS your scene?"

Sam shrugged. "The library?"

"Come on. Come with me and crash it. It's a frat party."

"Yeah I think you just hit the nail on the head why it has no appeal to me." He snorted. "Dean should have been the one to go to college. This would be his scene."

"Well I say free beer is free beer." Brady declared, squaring his shoulders and crossing the street.

Sam watched him for a moment and then jogged off after Brady's retreating figure. "Brady, come on!"

He was so friggin' predictable. How was Sam so see through? Now he'd launch into a talk designed to try and keep Brady on the straight and narrow. Which of course he wasn't, but Sam knew nothing of the blow and hook ups.

Brady mounted the steps to the old house with elaborate pillars.

"Brady! Stop."

Brady halted and turned around to look at the honest face. A group of people from the party pushed by him, loud and semi- intoxicated.

"Please," Sam said, his brow furrowing like a golden retriever. "I want to go home."

Brady crossed his arms, knowing that Sam in his Sam fashion was trying to look out for his friend and keep him out of trouble.

"Sam you can walk yourself home. There's no law that says you have to stay with me." Brady arched a brow as if a thought just occurred to him. " _Oh,_ you don't trust me. Too much temptation, huh?" The edge of his mouth tugged into a half smile.

"It makes sense to look out for each other." Sam said in such a logical way that it almost seemed plausible even to the demon.

"Sam..." Brady said, flicking his eyes up and down his friend in an appraising manner. "You are not your brother's keeper."

Sam mounted the steps after him and took Brady's arm. "Yeah I kind of am," he responded, completely missing the double entendre. He tugged Brady down. "Come on."

The demon paused, considering his options. "Okay fine." He said, following Sam back down the steps. "But then I'm at least cutting through the yard because it's way shorter. Or..." Brady gave him a teasing push with an elbow that Sam took with a good-natured smirk. "Are you going to rescue my failing morals by keeping me from jaywalking?"

Sam followed behind him as they rounded the side of the house. "Trespassing actually. Jay walking is what we just did to get across the street to get here."

"Probably the wildest thing you've ever done," Brady baited, waiting to see if Sam corrected him. He knew that despite the kid's white knight exterior, he and his brother and father had broken more laws than the average Alcatraz inmate.

Sam wasn't in a giving mood. He didn't reveal much of anything. "I have my fake ID." He said, twisting to avoid colliding with a few students making out.

They'd cut through the back yard and the din of the party was fading like a song ending on the radio.

Brady pulled a few steps ahead of Sam when he heard the commotion. He picked it up quicker than the human did, of course. A trapped cry. Desperate, bit off in fear. It attracted him like a moth to flame.

Sam seemed oblivious for a moment and then those hunter senses kicked in and the kid went alert, like a horse catching scent of a predator on the wind. "Did you hear that?" He asked.

Brady played stupid. "The atrocious choice in music? Yes I hear that."

"No," Sam said, his eyes straining in the dim light. "Someone crying."

Sam's instinct had him reacting before the words were fully out of his mouth. He headed off in the general direction of the sound, remarkably quiet for such a tall guy. Brady watched the blue sneakers negotiate the grassy terrain as Sam moved, his weight shifted onto the balls of his feet, ready to react.

Brady jogged after him. They rounded into the back yard of the ranch next door. The house had an immaculate patio replete with wind chimes and outdoor furnishings and a fenced-in pool. The crying was clearly audible now ,that they were further from the noise of the party.

Sam rounded the fence line like a panther on the hunt, following the low protests.

Two forms were visible against the corner of the patio. A terrified girl surrounded by a few tall males. Her mascara was running, her brown hair mussed.

Brady hung back as an observer for a moment. He knew immediately one of those frat boys wasn't actually who he appeared to be. The twisted horrid features flickered to Brady in the moonlight. One of his own. One of Azazel's pets.

Sam would not perceive this of course. He'd only see a few big, slightly inebriated seniors.

The taller of the two, the one who appeared to be human, had the girl pinned to his chest, his hand down her t-shirt. She'd given up most of her struggling and seemed to be on the verge of buckling, her weight being held up by him entirely. She seemed like a frozen rabbit, at the pint where they've found struggling is useless and they've gone catatonic with fear.

Azazel's Demon was standing in front of her with his mouth close to her ear.

Brady's supernatural hearing picked up the words. "That's it, baby. Struggle, cry."

"Hey!" Sam barked, his voice lower and more commanding than Brady would have imagined possible.

The Fratboy Demon snapped its head around to appraise the intruder. He rounded on the Winchester, confident, calm. "Cody. Hold her. Looks like I have to take care of some pussified momma's boy here."

"Let her go." Sam said, jaw tight.

"Or what?"

The muscle in Sam's jaw jumped and he adjusted his stance, wider, more secure, arms slightly out. "Or I'll make you let her go."

The frat boy's lips turned up into a predatory smile.

The girl cried out as Cody squished himself against her, clearly intending to proceed whether his friend was fighting or not.

Sam made a beeline for them. The Demon reached to tackle him and Sam nimbly deflected the attack and sidestepped without breaking momentum. He hit Cody in the nose with one swift blow from the heel of his hand.

Cody grabbed his face with a shocked cry and the girl slid into a trembling heap on the patio's textured concrete floor.

Sam didn't stay there long, he spun in time to dodge the power of the Demon's full blow from behind, but even so it glanced off the back of his head and knocked Sam's trajectory sideways a bit.

He slammed into the white vinyl fencing and it swayed dangerously.

The Demon grabbed Sam by the shirt collar and swung him around and pushed backward, Sam went with the momentum and tumbled to the ground but rolled to his feet in one smooth motion.

Cody saw an opportunity and dove at him from the side, his face a mask of blood from his broken nose.

Sam slipped out of the way in an evasive twisting move to get behind him, twisting the other man's arm into a lock.

Cody stiffened at the pain and Sam threw him into his demonic companion. The Demon, managed to keep his feet, but Cody was tossed into the vinyl fence. It gave under his weight with a rattling creak of snapping plastic and the big man fell onto the wooden deck below.

"Tom!" He yelled.

"Jackass." Tom reached over and grabbed the long-handled pool net off of it's spot resting against the destroyed fence.

Brady saw Sam's eyes widen at the weapon. He leaped back as Tom swung it toward his midsection.

Tom jabbed the handled part at him and it caught Sam in the stomach. He doubled over with a cry at the blow, but managed to drop to one knee to avoid the vicious swing aimed at the side of his head. The aluminum whistled through the air and Sam kicked out with one long leg. His sneaker connected with Tom's knee.

Tom lost his balance for a moment and Sam used the opportunity to grab the netted end of the weapon.

They pulled against each other and the extension handle snapped off. Both the men staggered back from the surprising release of tension. The net clattered impotently to the grass.

Tom held the shortened aluminum tube in his hand like a samurai sword.

He swung it at Sam's head and Sam deflected it with his forearm and stepped in close enough to catch his opponent with an elbow to the jaw.

Tom swore. He tried to jab the Winchester's momentarily exposed stomach, but Sam turned his body sideways and hooked his Tom's arm with his own in a spiraling motion to disarm him. Then punched again. The aluminum tube clattered to the grass and Sam kicked it out of reach.

Sam drew his hand back to land a solid blow and suddenly Cody grabbed him from behind and brought a knee up into Sam's kidney. Sam buckled and went down. Tom kicked him again.

Brady moved the weight onto the balls of his feet, ready to react if they actually did best his friend. Letting Sam get killed on his watch? Even if it was by the hand of one of Azazel's minions? No. No that wouldn't do at all.

 **TBC...**

 **Sorry for the long wait. This action scene was problematic for me. Thank you so much for the reviews last chapter. Michele, ShadowHuntingDD, Jenny, Dom Darkwolf, ncsupernatfan, Waiting for Aslan, and my two guest reviewers. Thanks again.**


	12. Chapter 12

Sam resisted the urge to block himself by going fetal and instead grabbed one of Cody's feet as he drew back for another vicious kick born of frustration and embarrassment. Sam caught his ankle and tugged hard.

The other man tripped and tumbled into Tom, who swore and sidestepped, narrowly resisting being taken down by his friend's weight.

Sam's fingers dug into the grassy lawn as he tried to scrabble up, but Tom grabbed hold of the collar of his shirt and launched him backwards with preternatural strength.

Sam fell through the fence and slammed onto the wooden deck next to the pool with a distinctly rag doll appearance.

He rolled with a moan, blinking to try to clear his head but before he could orient himself, there was a hand on the back of his neck and he was pushed under the water. Sheer panic tore through him as the cold closed around his head. He clawed violently at the surface, splashing a ten foot radius around him and succeeding at little else. The instinctive reaction was futile as Sam found no purchase. He finally realized his mistake and retaliated by trying to tear at the hands gripping his head by the hair. The hold tightened more, burning his scalp with its roughness. A murky red haze started to creep behind his vision like a curtain of blood and his own pulse pounded in his ears. His chest burned.

Brady saw Tom hold Sam under the water and he sprang into action a few seconds later. Cody blocking his path was nothing more than a nuisance that Brady swatted like a fly, rendering him half-conscious on the grass as the casual blow glanced off the side of his head.

Unimpeded, Brady jogged through the wrecked section of vinyl fencing and grabbed Tom's arm. The other demon looked up at him, all black eyes and demented visage. A face all too familiar, for it was like his own in a way. They didn't speak for a long moment.

Brady grabbed Tom and pushed him aside. Tom's grip tore out a hunk of brown hair as he fell back and Sam yowled under the water.

Brady grabbed his friend by the shirt and hauled him up. Sam came up with an inhuman half gargle gasp.

 _Great, the kid was gonna die after all this._ He should have intervened sooner. Brady forcibly dragged Sam's inert body a step or two away from the edge of the pool. He was aware of Tom, who had gotten up to watch him. He wasn't attacking, didn't come in for a retaliation. He wiped the blood off his mouth with the back of his arm and blinked. They shared a brief look as a silent understanding passed between them and Tom gave him the slightest inclination of his head.

Brady turned his attention back to Sam. He rolled him and thumped his back. "C'mon, Sam!"

Sam didn't seem to be able to get a breath. _Fucking human beings. So fragile._

Brady pushed in under Sam's diaphragm in a half-hearted imitation of a Heimlich Maneuver and the force of it made the boy vomit pool water. There was a sound of a ragged breath and Sam panted, then vomited again. This time what he brought up was composed more of mucous from his irritated trachea than water.

Brady rubbed his friend's back in a quick soothing pat. He was a fucking idiot charging in like that to save a girl he didn't even know. But there was so much predictable _Sam_ in the action. It was so _Sam_ to feel that he needed to take on the weight of other's problems. Poor empathetic idiot.

"You okay, buddy?" He asked, betraying none of his derision.

"Yeah," Sam wheezed out in between gasps. Brady helped him sit up after another moment.

Sam looked weak. A line of blood ran from his head down into his eyes. He wiped it away, smearing it across his face and the demon got a rush of pleasure from it. Recalling all the days of tearing souls apart on the rack. All the beautiful red that ran. Such a sumptuous contrast against pale skin.

Brady took Sam's head in his hands and tilted it forward, trying to get a look in the dim light. Human eyes were so damnably limiting.

He couldn't tell if Sam had sliced his head open in the fall or if Tom had torn the scalp when he had taken a hunk of Sam's hair. Possibly both.

"Sam, are you alright?" Brady asked.

"Yeah." He blinked. "Brady. Thanks, man. Where the hell were you?"

He coughed low and ragged.

"You disappeared all of a sudden, took me a minute to make it around the back of the house to find you, dude."

"Where are they?" Sam blinked red rimmed eyes and peered into the darkness.

Brady looked up. They were both gone. So was the girl. She's probably darted off like a frightened rabbit the moment she'd gotten the chance.

Sam stood up shakily, his shoes squeaked as he slipped a little on the deck. Brady caught him under the arms. "Woah. Easy sailor. Don't drown in the shallow end."

Sam wiped his nose with a sleeve. " _Drowning in the Shallow End_ should be the name of my autobiography."

Brady snorted in amusement, although he knew that if anyone had been thrown into the deep end at at young age, it had been Sam Winchester. _Thrown in The Deep End_ would have been more apropos.

"Where's the girl?" Sam asked, pushing off of Brady and attempting to climb over the fallen fence and up the slight incline. He went down on his knee once and Brady picked him up by the arm and hauled him up.

The lights flicked on inside the house. Brady looked up. "Shit, Sam. We gotta get out of here."

He dragged Sam stumbling out of the yard and into the cover of darkness before the kid had regained his bearings. "Let's get you home and let's avoid getting arrested tonight, okay?"

Sam nodded, then coughed raggedly and spit out more mucous.

"Sam you are gross as hell right now."

"Sorry," Sam panted.

The demon took him home to patch up.

* * *

Sam lay sideways on the couch with an ice pack tucked behind him. Brady mopped up the mess of blood from his forehead. "Sam..." he grabbed the lamp, which dimmed for a second and moved the light closer so he could illuminate Sam's scalp. "Oh my god. Buy a new bulb for this freaking thing already."

"I don't live here anymore. You buy it," Sam muttered.

"You and your logic." Brady retorted. His fingers traced Sam's scalp and Sam winced, sucking in a sharp breath.

"Stay still."

"It stings."

"No shit, Sherlock." Brady forcibly tilted Sam's head. "Goddammit, move your head so I can see."

"You have a terrible bedside manner."

Brady smirked. "Good thing I'm not going to be a doctor then. I doubt if the lab rats are going to care about my bedside manner."

Sam stiffened under his touch. "Doesn't that bother you at all?"

"What?" Brady asked absently. "This might need stitches. You bashed this pretty good, man."

"Torturing small animals for science."

Brady snorted. "Sam. They're rats."

"But they use other animals too. Beagles and monkeys. I kind of think it would bother me."

"Well do we just let everyone die then because we can't hurt a dog?"

Sam was quiet for a minute. "I'm not saying that. I'm just saying I'm surprised the ethical problem doesn't weigh on you just a little."

"Stop talking philosophy when you're concussed, man."

He released Sam's head and grabbed the Clippers from his med kit. "I need to shave the area."

Sam picked his head up, eyes round. "Oh, come on. It's not that bad."

Brady shook his head. "With that mop no one is gonna notice an inch-wide bald patch in the back, dude."

"I will," Sam muttered.

"Well tough." He turned them on and pushed on the back of Sam's head. He went with it and squinted his eyes shut as Brady expertly maneuvered the electric clippers.

"Why the long hair anyway, Benji? You'd look good with a nice haircut."

Sam shrugged. "My dad was ex-military. I guess it always rubbed me the wrong way to clip my hair short." In truth perhaps it felt like something Sam could control even if it was minuscule. His body. His choice. His passive rebellion.

The electric buzz went silent and Brady swabbed the wound with iodine. "Okay." He let go of Sam's head and grabbed a wickedly curved needle. Sam's jaw went tight. Nothing new to him. He was sure Brady would have more skilled hands than Dean. Although Dad had been competent enough to not even leave visible scars the majority of of the time.

The thought made his throat tighten. He cleared it.

Brady's fingers were on him again. "Okay, Sam. Hold still."

Sam felt the weird pinch and pull of the thread and needle on skin. Brady laid a row of three neat stitches and cut the thread.

"Done."

Sam let out a relived huff.

"That's gonna ache later."

"My whole body is going to ache later."

"True." Brady gave him a devilish smile. "That's only fun when it's from sex."

Sam huffed. "You sound more like my brother every day."

Brady peeled off his white latex gloves and threw them in the garbage. "Might want to sleep on your stomach for a few days."

Sam looked at him, unaware of the bruise forming on his face. "That will help my ribs."

"Complain. complain. Sleep here tonight."

Brady left the room. Sam was annoyed that he'd left the pocketed oxycodone pills hidden in his desk at his dorm.

 **Thank you Michele, ScarletandSage, NobodytheStormCrow, Sallyannerenee, ncsupernatfan, Dom Darkwolf, ShadowhuntingDD.**


	13. Chapter 13

Rebecca approached Sam with a warm smile. He turned his head reflexively to hide the mottled bruise and busted lip he'd sustained from his fight over the weekend.

She read the strange body language and cocked her head with a puzzled air. Her smile faltered. "Sam. What happened?"

He shrugged, gave her an apologetic grin. "I fell down the steps?" He said plaintively. Humor to deflect and ask her not to pry. Now Zach may have taken the cue. Dean certainly would have. Becky was a girl. There was no way she was going to let that derail her.

"Yeah, cute." She put her hand, delicate and elegant on his shoulder.

Sam ignored her touch and sat watching the other people shuffle out as the class ended.

"You look really banged up. What happened?"

"I got in a fight." Sam dropped his gaze to the floor. He worried his bottom lip with his tongue for a moment. The scabbed over split burned and threatened to bleed every time he moved his mouth.

"Why?" Rebecca's gaze was warm and sympathetic and puzzled. "You're not the fighting type."

He shrugged. "Couple of guys at a party." His soft tenor barely registered over the other voices.

She snorted. "Do you want to run that by me again?"

Sam edged out stiffly from behind the desk of the lecture hall. He was sore as hell. He took his head in his hands and sucked in a breath as his vision swam for a moment.

Rebecca's eyes were on him. "What's wrong?"

Sam's breath went out from the pain. He winced and shook his head fractionally. "I'm okay." He whispered. "Headache."

"Sam." Her hands were on his arm. "Do you want me take you to the nurse's office?"

"No. I'm fine. I really am."

"Come back to our place. You can crash with Zach and I."

Sam finally manned up enough to stand up properly and reach to scoop his books under his arm. He eyed his book bag sitting next to his desk warily. Ducking down to get that was going to be a challenge.

Rebecca seemed to anticipate his train of thought, so she reached to grab it, lifted it to the desk top. "Here."

Sam flushed. "Thanks."

"So you're fighting with guys at parties now. Is Tyson's new leaf rubbing off on you?"

He gave her a half smile. "I hope not."

"Sam, please come with me."

"Becky, I'm fine." He told her gently, unsure of what to do with the attention. Is this what civilian life was? Were people concerned over some bumps and bruises? Over a mild concussion?

She wasn't taking no for an answer. She tugged him after her by the shirt sleeve as easily as grabbing an errant puppy by the collar. Sam let her drag him, wincing as he stepped.

"My dorm is closer. I'd rather go back to my dorm room and lay down." He didn't tell her he had Vicodin stashed in his desk and he could really use one.

Becky tilted her head up, jaw set. "Tell me what you were fighting about. Come on, stop being annoyingly vague."

Her beauty really struck Sam sometimes. He knew Dean would have been on her faster than she could blink, but Sam didn't work that way.

Somewhere along the line he'd fallen into the friend zone and he was fine with that. But she smelled really good to him as he trailed behind her.

* * *

Rebecca won the debate of where to go by plying Sam with promises of pizza topped with everything and cold beer. Her diplomacy coaxed him back to the apartment she shared with her older brother, Zach.

Sam sometimes wondered if one of them were adopted because they looked nothing alike. Zach was dark and stocky, a compact man with beetle black hair and dark eyes.

Rebecca was like every California blonde in every movie ever. Thin and willowy, straight flaxen hair and perfect teeth.

Sam pried off the cap on his beer and slouched into their comfortable overstuffed tan couch. His shoulders relaxed into the softness and he took a swallow of beer. It crawled pleasantly down his throat. He'd gotten used to craft beers in his stay at Stanford, even though he and his brother had always just grabbed whatever they could pick up at a Gas and Sip.

His thoughts turned to Dean. Where was he? Was he okay?

Becky leaned over and pressed a cool cloth to Sam's forehead and he jumped a little at the unexpected sensation.

"Geez." She said. "Just a damp cloth."

"Sorry." Sam replied, a little embarrassed.

She left the cloth on him and settled into the loveseat across from him, folding her pretty bare feet under her in the pose petite women tended to use.

"So then you're a hero." She told him, having finally pulled the truth of his encounter out of him.

He shrugged. "I guess."

"You guess?" She scoffed. "Sam."

"I'm not exactly a white knight."

"Well." She cocked her head. "You look just like one to me."

He tried to hide his smile behind the bottle of Sierra Nevada as he took a swig. "Your white knights have black eyes and split lips?"

"Of course," she replied. "A knight with no dents in the armor is one who never fought."

That made him think of Dean for some reason. He quashed it down. Dean was like the chorus of a song over-played on the radio. There every time Sam turned it on. Anytime he had a free second or a minute to associate anything.

"Sam are you worried about Tyson?" Her brows knitted together.

"Yeah." Sam responded, removing the cool cloth. "Hasn't been himself in months."

"I see it too. Zach thinks I'm worrying needlessly."

Sam rolled his eyes. "Zach would. I've lived with the guy. He's been pretty heavy into the party scene and a little scary with the recreational drug use." He paused, took another sip. "I hate to watch him go down because he's gonna tank hard and fast."

Rebecca looked sad. "Such a good guy too."

"Yeah he was."

"Ever known an addict?" She asked.

Sam grew quiet for a moment and shook his head. "No, but my Dad drank a lot."

Her interest was suddenly keen, no doubt baited by the tiny bit of info Sam had just given her about his past. The very past he kept such a tight lid on.

"Alcoholic?" She asked.

He let a slow huff of breath out of his nose and then appraised the statement. He nodded. "Yeah. I guess. I guess he was." His fingers toyed absently with the label on his bottle. The glass was slick with perspiration. "He was really independent. Completely functional... so it's hard to think of him in those terms but he was always half in the bag it seems."

"You ever miss him?"

Sam's heart sped and skipped before it settled down. He didn't know what to make of it.

"Not really." He lied.

Part of it was true. He didn't miss the fights, the altercations, the clashing of wills.

He went quiet for a moment. "But I do miss my brother."

"I can't imagine life without mine."

The statement almost made Sam tear up. He hid it behind a swig of beer.

"Sam we're throwing a party in a few weeks. Come."

"We'll see." He replied absently. Fully not intending to.

"I won't take no for an answer."

She never did. Rebecca had mastered the velvet steamroller routine. Gently bullying you into whatever she wanted. Sam envied the gift.

His ribs throbbed. His head hurt again. The Everything Pizza hadn't settled in his gut as well as he'd hoped.

"Sam, are you okay?"

"Just have a really bad headache." He pressed a few fingers against the bridge of his nose and exhaled slowly. An image of his writing desk popped into his head randomly. He really wanted the pain pill he had stashed in there.

"Wow. Are you sure we shouldn't we take you to the nurse?"

"I'm sure," Sam replied, his response bitten off.

The pain eased a little and an image of the girl he'd saved the other night popped into his mind.

Sam was no stranger to random thoughts and flights of fancy but something about this felt oddly foreign to him. "Rebecca, I'm gonna go walk back to campus. I think I need to lie down."

"Are you safe to walk there by yourself? Maybe I should take you back?"

"No I'm fine. I'm gonna leave my books here I just...I really want to get into my own bed."

"Your shitty dorm bed that's too small for you versus our sprawling couch or Zach's memory foam mattress?"

The woman truly needed to be a sales representative.

"Why are you trying to take me hostage?"

"Because I've barely seen you in weeks. You are terrible about keeping in touch."

Sam looked away shyly.

"You have friends that care about you and then when something like this happens you don't even tell us." She had a way of putting something that might seem like a lecture coming from someone else in such a sweet way, you didn't mind.

"Okay." He said, recognizing the truth in her statement. "I'm sorry. I'll...I'll be better about it."

There was a knock on the door and Rebecca got up to answer it. "I forgot Shelley was supposed to drop by."

Sam groaned. He so wasn't up for meeting new people. Socializing took it out of him on the best of days, but on days like today, he just couldn't bring himself to engage in small talk. He stood up to use the interruption as an excuse to leave.

Rebecca opened the door and there stood the woman Sam had saved the night before.


	14. Chapter 14

Sam stood stunned. He opened his mouth to say something, closed it again.

Shelley, brown haired and attractive in an unremarkable sort of way, took a surprised step back when she saw Sam. Her little sundress flounced around her thighs with the movement.

Sam was pleased to see she didn't have any visible marks from her assault. Her mouth went open for a second and he saw something flash across her face. It was anything but welcoming. Anything but what he would have expected from her if he had ever come across her again.

Rebecca looked from one to the other. "I'm sorry but...do you two know each other?"

Sam looked to Shelley to take his cue from her. She backed away from him a little bit, features closed off, her jaw tight.

Rebecca's pretty face betrayed her confusion.

Sam averted his eyes, almost guiltily. Perhaps what had happened to her was something she didn't want to share with others just yet.

Shelley spoke first. "No. We've never met."

"Okay then, well this is Sam. Sam this is Shelley. Shelley goes to Palo Alto University." Rebecca gave him an appraising look. "Excuse Sam's appearance. He got jumped by a bunch of drunken frat boys when he was trying to help someone this past weekend. He normally doesn't look like he went ten rounds with the Michelin Man."

Shelley cocked an eyebrow. "That's too bad. Hope you feel better soon."

"Ugh, yeah thanks." Sam replied, feeling out of his depth with the exchange. He decided to use the time-held Winchester method of dealing with awkward situations. One Dean had perfected over the years. He tried to leave.

"Rebecca, I'm going back to my dorm. Nice to meet you Shelley."

Rebecca hugged him tightly. Sam winced a little at the embrace against his ribs. "You rest and call me if you need anything. Be careful with those dizzy spells and be careful going back to your dorm."

Sam gave a fond little half smile. He wondered if this was what it was like to have a mother. "Okay," he acquiesced.

He gave a quick smile, looked to Shelley with an encouraging nod before he ducked to grab his book bag and shouldered out the door.

* * *

The Palo Alto sun warmed his back as he walked stiffly back to campus. It was something he'd never adapted to in all his time here- the ever present sunshine. It made him feel as if he were on an overlong vacation that he just hadn't returned from yet. He supposed being raised in perpetual darkness made it difficult to trust the light.

Campus seemed a daunting walk, even though it honestly wasn't that far. Walking home while stiff from injuries wasn't a novel experience. Just one he hadn't felt in a while.

Sam had plenty of practice walking home from school with a split lip or an aching shoulder. He tried to avoid fights, tried not to call attention to himself but it seemed in every school that they went to, especially during junior high, someone had to try to test his mettle.

In a fair fight, Sam Winchester could take down just about any of his peers with little trouble. But kids didn't fight fair and sometimes he'd come out the worse for wear if he'd been ganged up on or someone had caught him flat footed or if Sam simply didn't WANT to fight. He didn't like hurting people. He didn't like getting in trouble from the school for fighting back. He tried to deflect, avoid, ignore. When those didn't work, he'd get in a scrape. Usually nothing more than a few punches.

And then he'd limp home and Dean would over react with threats to kill them or rip their lungs out. And Sam would have to go three rounds verbally with his hot-headed sibling to convince him that he didn't need his big brother galloping in to save him.

His father would simply look at Sam's black eye and shrug. Then he'd say the other guy better look worse and it was over.

The problem stopped in high school when Sam's height shot up dramatically and he was suddenly the tallest person in any given space.

So while the experience wasn't new, it had been a while and wasn't particularly welcome.

He thought of Shelley's reaction and couldn't puzzle it together. Although he also knew from his father's work that victims had a startling array of responses to trauma. Any one of them could be affecting her.

Sam wandered into the familiar tiled hall, shoulders slumped, and opened the door to his dorm. He threw his books in a heap onto the floor. They made the sound of a muffled thump and then a slide of paper landing on itself and shifting to fall where gravity took it.

Sam headed for his little antique desk. He opened it up and fished out the Oxy he'd nabbed from Brady's stash and hidden in the top shelf. Force of habit had made him snatch it and now he was glad he had. He dry swallowed the pill and wandered to his little dorm room ice box, grabbed a coke and popped the tab. He noticed that they were down a few drinks. His absentee roommate must have actually been in the room for a few hours.

It was a rare occurrence. Keith mostly shacked up with his girlfriend and only very occasionally dropped by the room he shared with Sam. It was to the point that some days Sam forgot he even had a roommate. The arrangement suited him just fine.

He flopped onto his too small mattress and had to cut off a whine of pain. His sore muscles contracted and hurt before they relaxed. He curled onto his side, his ankles hanging slightly off the bed. The springs poked into his ribs and he wondered again why one of the finest learning institutions in the world couldn't afford a decent goddamn mattress.

Sam felt distinctly miserable. The pain and lack of sleep compounded with the utter strangeness of his encounter with the girl shook him a little.

He hoped the pain pill wouldn't take long to kick in. He lay staring at the opposite wall for a bit. His rib was throbbing. His neck was a little sore from fighting being held under water.

Any other truly life or death situation he'd been in... Dean always had his back. No Dean now. Just himself. Just Sam. He wondered if his whole life would be that way?

Just Sam...

There was a staccato knock at his dorm door. He startled and then waited for it to repeat.

There it was again.

"Hang on." He called, trying to pull himself out of his exhausted tangle on the bed.

Sam hauled himself upright, despite the protests from his body, and staggered sideways a little. So the Oxy finally was starting to kick in. He wondered what dose this was because smaller doses didn't tend to affect him much but he felt decidedly dizzy until he righted himself and sat very still.

He limped to the door and opened it.

The girl he'd saved was on the other side.

"Shelley?" He asked, shocked, eyebrows raising into parenthesis.

She pushed past him, her little sundress incongruous with her hardened expression.

He turned to face her, his hand still on the door handle, blinking away the tired. "Hi?"

"So is that what you're going around telling everyone?" She crossed her arms, her expression pinched with confrontation.

Sam tried to follow her train of thought. He couldn't seem to get his brain back on the rails. "Is... what, what I'm telling everyone?" He repeated slowly.

"You're making yourself out like you're some kind of hero."

Sam took a step back, his head swimming from the Oxy and probably a mild concussion. "I..." he pinched the bridge of his nose. "...haven't told anyone anything but Rebecca. She kept pushing...to know what happened."

"So you told her that?"

Sam wrinkled his brow. "Told her what?"

"That you got beat up trying to save me from being raped?"

Sam blinked. "I didn't say anything about it being _you_. I...I didn't know it even was you." He paused. "I don't even know who you are."

She put her hands on her hips. "Exactly. You don't know anything, so maybe you shouldn't have jumped in and broken Cody's nose."

"Cody?" Sam kept feeling like he was trying to bring himself up to speed.

"My boyfriend's best friend."

The attic light went on in Sam's brain. "Your boyfriend?... _You knew them?_ " Sam shook his head. "... but they were... you were scared to death..."

"I had a good thing going with Tom and you blew it. He left that night. I haven't even heard from him. He's not answering his cell."

"They were going to rape you." Sam replied patiently. His jaw was throbbing.

"Rape me?" She threw her hands up. "Are you fucking kidding me?" She was turning hostile quickly, her mouth twisted into a sneer and her body language turned defensive.

"I heard noise and they were holding you in a dark corner and feeling you up. You were crying and frozen. What else was I supposed to think?"

She seemed a little taken aback by the description. Then volleyed back at him. "Well you were wrong. I mean we were all pretty fucked up." She furrowed her brow and Sam wondered if she actually remembered anything. "It was a fun thing out back of the party. The three of us."

"Well," Sam said, the beginnings of weariness seeping into his voice. "It certainly seemed like you changed your mind about anything being fun."

"It stopped being fun when you broke Cody's nose."

Sam sighed. He recognized the pattern. Woman in an abusive relationship. The instinct seemed to be to protect the abuser. He'd seen it time and again growing up in the places they'd stayed. Their Dad intervening and the wrath being turned on him. She probably had been so intoxicated she didn't even remember what had happened.

"Tell him to press charges then." He replied flatly.

"Keep your nose out of my business! I don't need chaperoning. If I want to drop some E and get drunk and have a good time with a couple hot guys that's _my_ business."

Sam gave her another weary look. "Okay. Are we done so I can lay down?"

"Thanks for ruining things with Tom for me, you asshole."

She grabbed the door handle and slammed out of his room.

His Dad's baritone rang in his mind. _"Sometimes son, someone doesn't know they need saving. You save them anyway."_

He'd done what he had to- his conscience was clean. Sam grabbed a can of beer from the freezer and held it against his Jaw as an ice pack before the flopped back onto the bed.

 **Thank you so much for the reviews! I have been a jerk about getting back to people about them. I promise I'll be better this time. Thanks Michele and Melissa for the advice on this chapter.**


	15. Chapter 15

Brady turned Sam's antique chair around and straddled it. He leaned his forearms on the back while Sam lay in a defeated heap on the mattress.

"So she bitched you out for saving her?"

Sam shrugged. "Kinda. I guess."

"See this is why you don't rush in to play white knight."

Sam rubbed at his temples. "Brady look I'm tired. If you've come to rub my nose in it..."

Brady tipped his head and flashed a dimpled smile. "Hey... I'm not rubbing anything of yours, okay? Becky on the other hand..."

Sam huffed. "Yeah, good luck with that."

"You don't think I could win her over?"

Sam's lips drew into a tight line as he evaluated his friend. "I think she has something called self respect."

Brady laughed. "Oooo. He slides one in." He stood up smirking and approached Sam.

Sam half sat up, a tangle of long limbs and shaggy bangs, and puppy eyes. He always looked like a chastised golden retriever when he was vulnerable. He was vulnerable now. So much so that it took a bit of self restraint to not jump into that beautiful meat suit and leave Brady's rotting on the floor.

Something inside of Sam seemed a little bit deflated. His light was dimmed, like dappled sun through trees.

Brady couldn't place what was wrong.

Physically, yes, he'd been beat to shit. Emotionally, maybe he'd taken a blow when the girl was pissed at him for saving her.

Dumb bitch. Women were so predictable like that. Always jumping in to protect their man. Even when that man gave them a black eye or a concussion. Couldn't tell the difference between love and possession.

But with the life Sam had lived, that didn't seem quite right as an explanation for his depressive mood. He had to have grown up witnessing that type of behavior in the slums they'd lived in. All the rat trap motels and bars their daddy had taken them to. He'd probably grown up hearing people having sex through the thin walls, cheating couples meeting for trysts, pimps slapping around their prostitutes. Desperate junkies with low self-esteem crawling back to their men. He may be disappointed by Shelley's behavior, but he wouldn't be surprised by it. This was just another facet of Sam's hard knock life at such a young age.

Something else seemed off.

Brady knelt down and tilted Sam's face up by the chin. "So..." he said, feeling the slightest bit of raspy stubble under his thumb. "How are these stitches holding up?"

Sam pulled away a little. "They're fine."

"I'll take them out in a few more days...Hey what's wrong with you, big guy?" He didn't know why he bothered asking. Not like Sam was going to surrender information suddenly.

"I'm just tired."

"You're more than tired."

"Yeah," Sam replied, flopping back onto the pillow. "I got the shit kicked out of me too."

Brady patted the boy's denim pant leg. "Sorry you got hurt for some dumb cow."

Sam gave him a reproachful look. "We don't know what her story is."

"She's an idiot." Brady replied dismissively.

"Maybe, " Sam said, looking like he didn't agree.

Leave it to Sam to try and see the other side of things. Always. It was both his strength and his weakness.

"I had to help, Brady. If we didn't do anything we'd be...complicit in the whole situation."

Of course _he_ would think that.

"That's bullshit and you know it." Brady answered.

Sam's eyes took on a determined air. There was a glimpse of that steel that underlied the lambswool fluff of him. It made Brady delighted to see, sent a shiver through him. Made his human skin goose pimple with it. _That_ is what would make him a brilliant addition to their ranks. He had all the right elements. They just had to get them working together in the correct way.

"I'd do it again if I had to." Sam said definitively.

Brady had no doubt that he would.

"Okay, Pollyanna."

Sam gave him the same hard look, somehow carrying an edge of defiance to it even when the kid was so tired he still had himself folded into his mattress like a gangly Great Dane trying to fit into a dog bed. Sam's gaze broke off and he put his hand over his eyes. "Brady I don't want to be antisocial but I've got a head ache."

Brady stood staring at him a moment and suddenly it occurred to him what was wrong.

Sam Winchester was...lonely.

Utterly alone.

He'd been longing for some real solid human connection. Something to replace the ache left by Dean's absence. The relationship with the true Brady had supplied that, but since Belial had taken over and they'd drifted on moral matters, Sam had pulled away emotionally. Fenced himself off so that he could protect that soft Sammy Soul.

And now...well now he was lonely. Lonely in his self-constructed, rather isolated prison. He was feeling the pull toward family and trying to resist it.

Brady had been biding his time, setting all the dominoes up, waiting to play the long con. Well now It was approaching the time to knock those dominoes over and watch them ripple as they toppled-with Sam none the wiser until the final one knocked him over.

Brady had the perfect blonde ray of sunshine in his sights. One to light up Sammy's lonely world for a while, just the thing to make him connect, bring him out of his shell, fill the yawning hole of emptiness inside him...they'd be a perfect match. Both of them none the wiser about a demon playing cupid.

Yes. The perfect flame for Sam to warm his hands by before it combusted and left him burned.

* * *

Sam was a Winchester. Which means he tended to heal quickly and when he didn't heal quickly, he shouldered through the pain like his father had taught him.

So after a few days of sore muscles and aching joints, he was back on his feet again, although feeling some sort of nagging loneliness that he couldn't quite keep at bay with books and studies and work.

Sam ignored the protest in his back and reached forward with the hedge trimmer to round off the edge of a manicured bush he'd started on. He'd had spare time to pick up some yard work. The pay was minimum wage but the guy let him pick up extra hours as needed.

Despite the slightly cooler day, Sam's shirt was soaked through with sweat. He felt a line of it drip down his back. It was odd how sometimes he preferred this work to the bookstore or tutoring. There was an honesty to it...a purity. A way to push his body through its endurance with hard physical labor. It tired him out at night and despite the ever present whirring of his mind, he slept soundly. Soundly enough to forget the occasional nightmare thoughts that plagued him.

That other life seemed so far away. So remote and removed from where he was. There were no ghouls in Palo Alto. No ghosts. Nothing more dangerous in the night than drunken frat boys, although, he thought dolefully, perhaps they were some times the most dangerous of all.

The utter normalcy of it all almost made him question if his other life had been real.

 _Had it?_ Had the sweat and blood and horror all been real?

Sam wiped a bit of green pulp from a shorn branch off of his forehead with his arm. He blinked away the dirt.

He wondered if somewhere dark and scary Dean was sheering off something's limbs with a chainsaw. The thought made his lips draw into a thin line.

 _Dean._

His dad he didn't often miss... but _Dean._

There was that refrain that he couldn't shut out. It sounded like his brother. His brother and their life together and Dean's voice and his affectionate "Hey Sammy" and fighting over the last waffle until Dean eventually let Sam have it.

That refrain.

Late nights and secrets and girls and fights and confidences. Squabbles and pranks and having each other's backs and being together forever- and Dean siding with Dad.

That brought Sam's reminiscences to an abrupt halt, yanked him out of his nostalgia and called up that bitter disappointed anger simmering underneath. Dean didn't take his side. When the chips were down and Sam had _really_ needed him as backup, Dean had tried to play middle man. When middleman failed, he had stepped over the line onto Dad's side.

Sam picked up the severed branches by hand and hurled them into the open back of the pickup truck, destined for the wood chipper.

 **Thank you Michele, domino dark wolf, shadowhuntingDD, and Sallyannerenee for the reviews. Love you guys!**


	16. Chapter 16

Sam slipped into his old stained campus mattress wearing his boxers. His hair was still damp from his shower. From the desk across from him he saw his phone screen light up.

He furrowed his brow.

It buzzed.

Sam dragged himself out of bed with a groan and padded across the floor. He picked it up and looked and looked at the text. It said: _Bitch?_

Sam huffed out a reluctant snort of amusement and pulled out his desk chair. He sat down heavily on it and stared at the phone screen. He chewed on his nail for a moment, totally absorbed in his own thoughts. _Should he call him? Send a text back? Two years without a word from Dean and now this? Was something wrong?_

 _Jerk?_ He sent back. He waited. And waited. Set the phone down put his elbow on the desk and leaned his head on the back of his hand, blinking groggily. Should he call him?

He looked at the time on the phone. 12:30 am. A bit late for Sam nowadays but prime time for Dean.

Sam picked up the phone and flipped it open, his mind now a bit worried about what was going on.

 _What's up?_ He sent.

The phone rang and it startled Sam so much that he almost dropped it.

His heart leapt and he took a second to calm down before he answered.

"Dean?"

"Sam."

Sam wrinkled his nose. "Yeah. What's wrong?"

"What's the name of the girl smurf?"

Sam blinked. _"What?"_

"The girl smurf."

Sam pulled the phone away from himself to stare at it with his brow furrowed before he put it back to his ear. "Smurfette?"

"Well yeah I _know_ it's Smurfette but like was that her actual name?"

Sam snorted. "Are you drunk?"

"Dude. That's not relevant to this conversation."

"You don't talk to me for two years and then you call me at almost 1 am to ask me about fucking smurfs?"

"No the smurfs aren't fucking Sammy, obviously, cause there's like only one chick. She Must be a slut. There's gotta be more than one chick, right? I mean otherwise all the girls would be named Smurfette. So she's gotta have like a real name besides that."

"Are you smoking pot?"

There was pause. "So you don't know if she had another name?"

Sam wasn't sure whether to be amused or annoyed. "No. No, Dean, I don't know."

He felt the weighted pause on the other line. "Is this what you called me for? Are you okay? Is...Dad okay?" Sam opened the desk drawer and got out the little 5x7 picture he kept of his mother and father. He barely recognized Dad... clean shaven and happy. He traced his thumb around the edge while he waited for Dean to respond.

"We're fine. Course if you cared about that you coulda called or somethin."

Sam felt his dander rise immediately. "You know Dean that goes both ways," he snapped a little heatedly.

"I'm callin now, ain't I?"

Sam tried to rein in the wave of anger he felt toward his brother. He logically knew that Dean didn't deserve it. He might even be trying to reach out in his own weird way. "What's up, man?" Sam asked.

Dean hesitated again.

Sam could sense his discomfort. He felt almost uncomfortable himself, completely at a loss as to what to say. Words of Dean's around the night they parted echoed through his head. _How well am I going to fit into this new chapter, Sam?_ They seemed to have come to pass despite Sam's determination that they wouldn't.

Dean... Dean didn't belong here in the orderly quietude of Stanford. In the California sun. Dean was from another life. One Sam didn't want. Almost didn't want to be reminded of, even. How could it be that the thing Sam loved the most reminded him of so much bad?

"Wanted to see what's up with you." Dean said.

"I'm good. I take it you've been watching smurf reruns?" Sam asked, deliberately deflecting the question back onto Dean.

"Caught the tail end of one and just realized that there's only one girl and she has a name like Smurfette."

Sam knew damned well his brother couldn't have simply called him after all this time...God... _years_ even, over a smurf question. He was calling and breaking the ice with something innocuous and then feeling his way around to see how Sam would receive him.

"Where are you guys now?" Sam asked.

"Wisconsin."

"Jeez. That feels like a state we haven't been to much."

"Yeah. Coven of freaking witches. Hate them."

"Yeah I remember." There was another stilted pause. Sam felt his heart tug. He and Dean had always had comfortable silences. Companionable lapses of communication...this was awkward. They were both dancing around the elephant in the room. Trying not to step on the landmines that surrounded them. Trying to get a feel for one another without diving headlong into a fight or spooking the other one off. That bond...that airtight _bond_ between them felt stretched and brittle.

Sam blinked back tears as a sudden swell of emotion hit him. He wasn't prepared for it and it took him sideways. He fell silent while he struggled to keep the emotion out of his voice. But his throat was tightening with words he wanted to say but couldn't. When he'd walked away, he'd meant to walk away from their lives, but he hadn't really meant to walk away from _Dean_.

His big brother was just collateral damage in the explosion between father and son.

"Hey," Dean's voice broke his reverie. "You still there?"

"Dean," Sam said hesitantly. "Why are you calling?"

He heard the affront in his brother's voice. "Oh I'm sorry, Sam. Didn't realize it was such a freaking inconvenience for you."

"That's not what I meant and you know it."

"Yeah it's never what you meant, is it Sammy?"

Sam's sorrow turned to annoyance in a fraction of a second, an automatic ingrained response to his brother's tone.

He gave an exasperated sigh. "Something is wrong or you wouldn't have called me. What is it?"

"You think I only call when I need somethin?"

"Yeah, Dean." Sam shot back a little heatedly. "Yeah, you kind of do."

"You know what. This was a bad idea."

Sam knew where this was headed. He tried to scramble to keep it from imploding. "Don't hang up...I just..." he took a breath, unsure where to go with this. What did he even have to talk about Dean with? What common ground was left to stand on? "Hey, I got my ass kicked in a fight a few weeks ago."

He sensed Dean's interest.

"Yeah? Butting heads over algebra?"

Sam snorted. "Couple of frat boys trying to rape a girl."

"Those assholes!" Dean paused. "You git your ass kicked? Did you lose the fight?"

"No...kinda. My friend jumped in to help. We got her out. I just got a little banged up in the process."

"That's my boy." There was a touch of pride in his voice. "Don't be getting soft out there now. You should have been able to take two frat boys."

"Yeah." Sam said. "I really should have."

"Don't forget your training."

"Okay. I'll go find more frat boys and practice on them next week so I don't lose my edge."

He heard the smile in Dean's voice. "Atta boy. Knew I could set you straight...You got a bunch of college babes?"

Sam rolled his eyes to the ceiling. "No."

"Why are you wasting that opportunity, man? Was the chick you saved _grateful._ Huh?"

"What happened with the coven?" Sam asked softly.

He could feel Dean's sudden emotional shift on the other side of the phone. Sam thought it odd that could sense that nonverbal shift. He'd almost forgotten their ability to feel what the other one was thinking. He knew by the silence that he'd struck a nerve.

"Nothin." His brother replied.

"You tracked down an entire Coven for nothing?"

"Of course not. They were doing their usual witchy bullshit."

Well that narrowed down absolutely nothing. Sam took a stab in the dark. "You always do your best, Dean."

There was a sharp inhalation. "Do I?"

"Yeah. Yeah you do."

"Doesn't feel like it's good enough sometimes."

"Tell me about it." Sam commiserated.

"What do you mean? You do well when you aren't even trying."

"My best was never good enough for Dad."

It was the wrong thing to say.

Dean's voice took on a sharp edge. "Oh here we go. Throw Dad under the bus."

"Stop trying to defend him all the time." Sam replied, feeling betrayed again.

"Then quit talking crap about him."

"You know what? Fine." Sam snapped a bit petulantly.

Dean always reduced him to this. Always reduced him to reacting like like a ten year old. He hated it. Hated it.

"You hurt him." Dean said quietly. His tone somber.

" _I_ hurt him? What about _me_?"

"What about it?"

"He threw me out, Dean. For going to college. For Stanford! You think I'd have chosen to stay away this long if he hadn't given me an ultimatum?"

"Hey, you chose that over family."

"I shouldn't have to have chosen between either! Why is this even an issue? Why can't we be a normal family that's proud of their son for going to a prestigious university? This is _ivy league_ , Dean. And I made it." Sam's voice caught. "I really made it here on my own."

"Ivy league, huh. Yeah rub that in, little brother."

Sam's lip twitched. "I didn't... I'm not rubbing it in."

"Then why are we talking about it?"

"I..." Sam tried to wrestle down his emotions. Tried to swallow his urge to fight. To make Dean see why he deserved to be here.

"I don't know." Sam replied. He felt a wet warmth trickle down his upper lip. He wiped his runny nose with his arm and fought down another wave of frustration as he realized that he was never going to be able to make Dean see why he deserved to be here. Was never going to make him or Dad proud of the accomplishment. Was probably never going to be able to have them in his life in any meaningful way at all. He pushed the emotion down, felt his heart give a few hard thumps before it calmed once more.

"Hey," he said, keeping the agitation out of his voice. "Why don't you come visit sometime? I can show you around."

Dean snorted derisively. "Yeah I'm sure they'd love a guy like me showin' up."

"What's that supposed to mean?" Sam pinched the bridge of his nose and winced at a sudden headache building behind his eyes.

"What do you think it means."

"You know, Dean. A lot of the people here are good people. You're judging them and you know nothing about them."

"I know how people like them look at guys like us." Dean replied evenly.

"They look at me just fine." Sam stood up and walked the few paces over to his bed and sat on the edge. It creaked under his weight. He had to shift to keep from falling into the sinkhole created by his ass. "You know dorm mattresses are actually shittier than the ones at most of the motels we stay at."

"All the money you pay and they can't give you a decent freaking bed?"

Sam wiped his nose again and looked at his arm. It was smeared with blood.

His eyes widened in surprise and he glanced around for tissues.

"Sam? You still there?"

"Uh...Yeah." Sam responded. "I actually don't pay any money..." he went for the tissue box on his roommate's dresser. It was empty. He swore.

"Sam are you having a seizure. What is going on?"

Sam tilted his head back a little. He grabbed one of his used shirts from the bedroom floor and pressed it to his nose to stanch the bleeding. The sour smell of old laundry convinced him that was a bad plan and he dropped it and held the back of his hand to his nose.

"I'm sorry, man." He folded a leg under him and sat back on the mattress and sniffed. The metallic taste of blood trickled down the back of his throat and he coughed. "My nose started bleeding."

"You know, you used to get nosebleeds all the time as as kid."

Sam blinked. "I did?"

"Yeah. You bled all over the backseat of Baby once."

Sam felt slightly thrown off balance by his brother's memory of something he didn't quite recall. Usually Sam's steel trap mind forgot nothing and Dean's memories were vague and foggy.

A drip of red hit the white sheets.

"I hardly remember that."

"I do. It was kinda gnarly to have your nose start running like a faucet."

Another spatter hit. Sam picked up the corner of the sheet and held it pressed to his nose. He waited patiently for it to clot. "I remember that time you elbowed me in the face before school and chipped my tooth."

"That was an accident. We were wrestling."

"You were trying to dump my book bag." A red spot was blooming across the white cotton in his hand. "There's blood all over my bed sheets. Its gonna look like a murder scene."

"Or like you popped someone's cherry on prom night."

Sam winced involuntarily. "Oh God, Dean. Can you be more disgusting?"

"Yes."

"That was an observation, not a challenge." Sam blinked, the room shifting weirdly with an image of warped floorboards. He blinked and it was gone. "Dean I gotta call you as soon as I get this so stop okay?"

"Sure."

Sam hung up the phone and jogged down the hallway to the bathroom.

His bleed had finally begun to clot by the time he grabbed some toilet paper off the roll and held it to his nostrils. He tipped his head back and took a few deep breaths through his mouth.

A few minutes later when he was reasonably certain that it wouldn't start up again he threw the tissue away and looked at himself in the mirror above the sink.

His upper lip was smeared with red and so was the back of his arm where he'd been wiping his nose.

Sam sighed and turned on the water. It smelled sulfuric. He blinked and shut it off again.

He'd never smelled sulfur water in the tap before. He wondered if something had disturbed the water table nearby. He'd had plenty of run in with the rotten egg smell of old wells in abandoned buildings as a kid.

He turned the water on again. The tap sputtered a moment before the water sprayed out. The smell was slightly less intense. He soaped up his arm and rinsed it off. Then splashed water onto his face.

Someone rushed in a bit sloppily and burst into a bathroom stall to vomit. Sam winced at the sound and wiped his face dry with his shirt and left.

He headed down the mostly empty hall, suddenly missing living off campus. Next semester he figured he'd get a room mate and jump ship to an withdrawn nature never seemed to make dorm life easy on him. He simply didn't want to move back in with Brady with the way he'd been acting. And Zach and Rebecca felt like he was crashing their party as a third wheel.

He wandered back to his room. The laundry pile was sprawled on the floor in a riot of blues and greys. He had no one to blame but himself for leaving his clothes for so long. He hated laundry. He'd picked up the habit from life on the road of letting it pile up until it could not be ignored anymore and then taking huge loads into the laundromat.

He thought of himself and Dean waiting around watching the spinning glass front washers swirl soapy suds in fascination as children. Then later on with resentment and boredom at their chore. Dean livened things up by switching people's wet laundry into adjoining washers if they'd left them there unattended. He smirked to himself when he watched the inevitable bafflement or explosion from the owners when they returned.

God, he was as ass sometimes.

 _Dean_. Sam realized he should call him back. He flipped the phone open and stared at Dean's number. He had no idea why it'd become so hard to call his brother. But it still was.

He pushed the call button, his heart racing weirdly. It rang. And rang... then went to voice mail.

"Hey it's me. Heading to bed I guess. Catch ya later."

Sam hung up the phone, feeling oddly melancholy.

It was quite a while before Sam realized that Dean never really did say what went wrong with the coven.

 **Thank you to my reviewers as always! Michele, ShadowhuntingDD, SallyanneRenee, ncsupnatfan, Fanpire101, Dom Dark Wolf, Warner 02. All appreciated!**


	17. Chapter 17

Sam sat on one of the benches outside the library, legs stretched out before him, reading in the sunshine. It was just cool enough to maybe need one of his old flannel shirts. Like the very first chill of an approaching NY autumn. Except that this chill was more like winter for Palo Alto.

Rebecca slid in beside him and he looked up from his heavy Pre-Law book. "Hey."

She nudged him playfully. "Hey."

She gave him her beautiful smile and Sam found himself reluctantly smiling back.

"Soooo," She began. "We're having a party for Zach tonight."

Sam winced. "I forgot."

"Well, its his birthday so you better show up. It's down at Roger's."

Roger's was a college hangout down the street from their apartment. Sam knew it well.

He hesitated. "You know I hate parties. I won't know anyone there."

"Well _I'm_ there. Duh. And Zach and Brady."

Sam sighed and Rebecca snuggled into his side a little. He let her. He still wasn't quite used to people so openly demonstrative with their affections, but part of him really liked it. He put his arm around her.

"You're going to make me, aren't you?" He asked with a note of resignation in his voice.

"Of course I am."

Sam gave her a warm smile. "Of course you are."

* * *

Despite his almost terminal shyness, Sam Winchester had always done well with women. He discovered early on that women liked to talk and they liked to talk about themselves. And since Sam neither liked to talk much, nor talk about himself, it was a comfortable balance.

So it was no surprise that even though Sam came to the party late and plunked himself down in an empty corner alone, the thin brunette that Zach had introduced him to settled in across from him and didn't leave his side.

Sam listened politely to her, asked the right questions at the right times and feigned interest in her topics of conversation.

Three beers in and she was starting to get physically demonstrative and even more loquacious. He wasn't looking to go back to his dorm with anyone tonight. Had never been into casual sex the way that his older brother was.

He was wondering when he could disentangle himself from her when Brady placed an heavy hand on his shoulder and gave the brunette a charming smile. "Tracey...hey. hope you don't mind. I need to borrow Sam here for a moment."

He slapped Sam roughly on the shoulders and ushered him to his feet.

Sam stood up with a muttered apology.

Brady gave Tracey an appreciative glance before slinging his arm around Sam and moving them across the crowded room, his expensive loafers treading alongside Sam's scuffed old blue tennis trainers. "So my friend Jessica needs some help moving her stuff to a new dorm this weekend. She really needs someone to help with the heavy lifting."

Sam snorted. "And lemme guess. I'm the heavy lifter."

"Well you know, I may or may not have volunteered your services," Brady said with a slick smile. "I know this sap named Sam who can't resist helping someone in need."

Brady expertly weaved his way through the crowd, somehow avoiding colliding with elbows and red mugs of beer. He guided Sam along next to him like an inexperienced dance partner, pulling him and changing his trajectory to snake his way through the throng without missing step.

"It's a weird time to be changing dorm rooms, isn't it? I mean mid year like this." Sam asked above the din.

"Yeah, well here's the issue. The water pipes in her dorm room burst or some damn thing." Brady explained, leaning toward Sam's ear. "They need to totally gut the place to clean it up. The walls, the floor. So they're relocating her to a dorm room down the hall."

"Wow." Sam said. "I wonder what caused that?"

Brady shrugged. "Old buildings, ancient plumbing. You know how they are."

"Yeah," Sam replied with a soft huff, his eyes a little distant, filled with something unreadably somber. "Sure do."

He winced as they moved closer toward the DJ and the music grew a bit louder.

Brady walked him up to a high top table where Zach and Rebecca and a long haired blonde were sitting huddled together. Sam gave them a nod. Happy birthday." He said to Zach. He settled onto a vacant stool next to Becky and Brady slung his arm over his friend's shoulders again in slightly tipsy camaraderie. He caught the blonde's attention and she looked up. "Hey Jess. This is my buddy Sam Winchester."

Jess looked up into Sam's eyes with a radiant smile that took his breath. A waterfall of golden hair tumbled around her shoulders. Her blue eyes were alight with humor, with some innocent effervescence that drew Sam's somber nature to it like like a moth to an open flame. They were the eyes of someone who hadn't seen a thousand unspeakable horrors. Who didn't know what that bump in the night might be. Who didn't know anything about mothers burning in their nurseries.

"Sam," Brady said. "This is Jessica Moore."

Sam ducked his head shyly, and his bangs fell over his forehead. "Nice to meet you." He said with his dimpled smile. He jerked his chin toward his friend. "Brady says you're in need of some help moving."

"Yes." She replied, leaning her forearms on the table and angling her head toward Sam so she could be heard through the din. "The pipes exploded in my dorm room. The whole floor is warped and the walls look like the Titanic after it hit the iceberg." She took a sip of her Margarita. "Crazy, right?"

Sam briefly wondered if she was old enough to be drinking. "Yeah." He replied.

Both Zach and Rebecca had turned their attention toward them, either interested in the subject matter or captured by Sam's interest in her.

Brady shoved a beer in Sam's hand and Sam looked up at him in silent appreciation.

"So, long story short," Brady said, casually sitting down next to Sam, looking for all the world like a real life Ken doll. "Sam is helping you move Saturday."

Sam looked over at him. "I am?" He looked back at Jess and saw those beautiful dimples as her eyes slid from his face to Brady's and back to his. "I guess I am."

Sam took a sip of Yeungling.

Jessica Moore was beautiful. He tried to keep his attention off of her cleavage as she leaned over the table to talk to them. "It happened all of a sudden a few nights ago. I was in bed and you could hear the pipes creak and then all of the sudden water was spurting out of the walls."

Rebecca grabbed her brother's beer and took a sip before she slid it back over to him. "Didn't something like that happen with you one time, Sam?"

Sam sat for a moment, a look of concentration on his face as he tried to sort through what tale he might have told Becky. "Well, we lived in this old place with steam radiators once." His eyes grew a little distant for a second. "...and they made this terrible rattling noise in the walls. We were sleeping and the little valve on the end blew off the radiator and shot across the room. Scared the crap outta my brother. Don't know if that compares though."

Jess gave him another smile. "Yay for steam heat?"

He snorted. "Yeah. Takes forever to warm the space too."

Rebecca frowned. "I'm sure there was something else you told me." She looked like she was trying to remember but gave up and shrugged.

"So where are you from, Sam?" Jessica asked, toying with the umbrella in her drink.

Sam took a moment to answer. "Kinda all over. I was born in Kansas but we moved a lot."

She looked him up and down. "Army brat?"

"Kinda." Sam didn't elaborate.

"Don't you know that Sam has no past?" Zach said, beetle black eyes locked on his friend before he gave a wink.

"Sam was raised by wolves." Brady interjected. "He won't talk about himself so we all take turns making up backstories for him."

Sam took the ribbing good-naturedly, with his usual placid nature.

"Didn't Zach come up with the one where he was the love child of Barbara Streisand and Tom Selleck."

Sam's dimples showed and Jess laughed.

"Oh, the one where he was raised in the circus," Rebecca snapped her fingers. "His parents were killed by clowns."

"Hey," Sam deadpanned. "Clowns are evil."

Jessica rolled her eyes with a smile. "Come on. What did he really do? Was I right, military?"

Sam weighed what he should say before he said it and gave his pat answer. "Dad was an ex-marine but he took on a traveling sales job when we were older."

"What did he sell?"

Sam shrugged. "Whatever. Vacuums and stuff."

"That sounds kind of..." she took the umbrella tooth pick out of her drink and opened and closed it with her fingers as she talked. "Bleak." She laughed.

Sam shrugged. "It wasn't ideal...how about you?"

"Oh, I'm from California. A little up the coast."

Brady listened with interest. He could see immediately that he'd chosen the match well. Sam Winchester was lit up in a way he'd seldom seen from him. He was genuinely attentive. His eyes just drinking her in, all that long legged American Beauty.

He hadn't frozen like a deer in headlights when presented with a girl that interested him. That was a nice turn of events. For some reason Brady had expected that perpetual shyness to take over, but it hadn't won out.

A half smile curved Brady's lips as he observed them. The conversation had a nice comfortable flow to it, but what really impressed him was Sam's utterly adept way of dodging personal questions. Deflecting his answers back onto her so that she fed him so much about her and he revealed so little about himself. Yet he still seemed an open book. The life he'd led had crafted Sam Winchester into a consummate liar. It came so naturally to him that he probably didn't even know he was doing it.

If Sam was not the person he was, the gentle good-hearted man he was determined to be, well he'd actually be... dangerous. All that charm and looks and verbal acuity. All that effortless dodging and deflection and secretive nature. Cult leaders were made of what Sam had naturally.

Once again, Brady found himself impressed with Azazel's choice for his second in command. For a moment, he even wondered if it was even a wise plan to turn Sam at all.

Azazel would have to watch his back from his own lieutenant. But then again, demons were used to doing that. And the yellow-eyed demon in particular had done just that for centuries.

Jess, for her part, was falling under Sam Winchester's spell immediately. Honestly, what woman wouldn't? Except, he supposed, for one of those stupidly self-destructive chicks drawn to men with tattoos and leather jackets that held the intriguing promise of shredding their lives.

Jessica Moore wasn't that kind of girl. She was drawn to the light. She'd be drawn to the light in Sam and equally drawn to healing the shadows she saw in his smile. The fatal flaw of women every where. -The instinctive need to nurture twisted into trying to help the psyche of a broken man.

Brady could see how much Sam wanted this. How much he wanted a real human connection underneath all his reserve.

Poor Sam.

Sam cocked his head, listening to Jess talk with something akin to fascination. Brady could spot the almost imperceptible drifting of his attention to her cleavage now and again. So Sam _was_ alive. _Hallelujah._

He had fallen under her spell already and Brady hadn't even had to push. Didn't even have to nudge really. He'd merely opened up the door to the trap and Sam had voluntarily wandered in.

"So," Jess said, volleying the subject back to Sam. "Where did you go to high school? What were your aspirations? How'd you end up here with these losers?" She nudged Zach playfully.

Zach's dark brows knitted together. "Losers? _Excuse me?_ Who needed to borrow my car for a week because she drove into a tree?"

"Hey!" Jess nudged him again then looked at Sam. "I swerved to avoid a dog."

"Yeah that's what she tells people."

Sam watched the exchange with silent amusement.

"Worst Chem Lab partner ever," Zach continued.

Jessica rolled her eyes. "You ever take a class with this guy?"

"Actually, yes." Sam replied. "Intermediate Latin."

"How do you say jerk in Latin?" She asked.

Sam paused, wrinkled his brow. "I think...malum."

"Seriously?" Rebecca asked. "You actually know the Latin word for _jerk?_ " She looked over to Jessica. "He knows everything. It's almost annoying."

Sam flushed a bit and dropped his gaze. "Not really. I'm just good at Latin."

Brady knew why. "Sam is a repository of weird knowledge." He said.

Jess smirked and looked at Sam again. "Why is that?"

Sam shrugged, his confidence slipping just slightly. "I'm... I guess I just like weird subjects."

Brady stage whispered. "He _is_ a weird subject."

Jessica was decidedly amused. "Hey Sam," she said. "Don't worry. I know Brady is the weirdest subject of them all." Her eyes searched the room. "Wanna go outside for some air? I'm gonna grab another drink."

Brady opened his mouth to say something and she pointed at him. "No. You...mouth shut."

"Careful, Sam," he said, slapping the young man on the back. "This one is bossy."

Jess stood up, giving them both a nice view of that jean clad backside as she moved through the crowd. Nope. Sam did not stand a chance. Not one chance.

Brady took a sip of his beer and smiled.


	18. Chapter 18

Sam finally found Jessica Moore standing outside on the porch in the somewhat crisp night. She looked an angel and once again Sam found himself taken with her beauty.

Jess smiled at him. "There you are."

She handed him a bottle of beer by the neck. "Grabbed you one."

"Thank you." Sam expertly banged the cap off on the side of the porch railing.

He looked to Jessica. She grinned sheepishly and handed him hers so he could do the same thing.

"My brother has a ring he always uses to twist off the caps with," he said as he lined it up and gave it a quick sharp jerk down. The top flew off into the bushes.

He smiled. "But I always preferred guillotining them off on the side of the table."

He handed her the opened bottle and she took a sip.

Sam took a swig himself. This was his fifth beer of the night and he was actually starting to feel a little pleasantly warm buzz.

Jess inclined her head to the door. "How long have you known Zach?"

"Oh since I've been here." Sam replied. "Probably about 2 and a half years. You?"

"Just the past year." She leaned against the porch railing with her ass. She was a tall girl, Sam noted. Almost as tall as Dean. He didn't dwarf her like he did most of the women he met.

"How about Brady?"

Jess wrinkled her nose. "Mmmm. I think about four months ago. He's in my class but we never talked til then. He had to borrow my book."

"So you have a brother?" She raised an eyebrow.

"Yeah." Sam replied.

"I'm an only child. I always wanted a sibling like Zach and Rebecca are."

Sam's mouth tightened a little. "They've got something special."

Jess's eyes grew penetrating and Sam could see a glimpse of the intellect behind them. "Not close to your brother?"

Sam paused. "We," he took a breath. "Drifted when I moved away to college."

"So you don't talk often?"

Sam shrugged. "We talked recently but it's been close to two years."

Her eyes widened. "Two years? What about holidays and stuff?"

Sam looked out into the night. "I haven't really spent them with my family since I left for college."

She was staring at him. "You don't even talk to your mother? All moms want their babies home for the holidays."

"My mom..." Sam paused, unsure of how much to reveal. The alcohol made him more loquacious than usual. "She died when I was six months old in a house fire."

"Oh my god!" Jess tipped her head. "I'm really sorry."

"It's okay." Sam replied, moving to stand next to her and leaning his own ass on the railing. He scuffed the toe of his sneaker against the ground. "I mean I don't remember her at all. It's always just been me and my brother and our father."

"And your dad moved you around a lot?"

"Yeah." He blew out a long breath.

"So why don't you talk to your brother?" Jess asked, closing her full lips around the bottle neck and taking a long pull before she spoke again. "Is he a jerk or somethin'?"

"No." Sam replied reflexively, almost a little defensively. "No. Dean's not a jerk... well," he huffed a little amused breath out of his nose, "not usually anyway."

"Then why don't you talk to him?" She asked conversationally.

Sam dropped his eyes, one side of his mouth turned up in a nervous almost smile. "He... my dad drew a line in the sand and Dean, well he stayed on the other side of it."

"So you're angry at him."

"No...not angry just..." Sam paused, searching for the correct wording. "Disappointed. I always thought he'd have my back."

Jess turned her head to watch him closely. "So basically you're angry at him."

"I'm not ang..." Sam paused in mid protest. Oh she was dangerous. She wasn't even going to let him lie to himself without calling on him on it. "Okay. Yeah I guess a little."

She studied him carefully. "You feel betrayed he took your father's side over yours."

Sam dropped his gaze to the floorboards. Studied the wooden slats, worn in spots. "Guess so."

She clicked her nail against the amber glass of her beer bottle. "Betrayal is the worst emotion."

Sam brought his eyes back up to meet hers. "You're speaking from experience, I take it."

"Yes." She shook her head. "My last boyfriend cheated on me."

"What an idiot." Sam said without even thinking.

She grinned at him and her dimples gave her a playfully innocent look. "I like to think so... hey I want to thank you in advance for helping me out even though this is like no warning whatsoever."

He shrugged. "It's fine. Really. I don't mind at all. Just feed me pizza and I'm good."

"I will get you the best pizza. But mostly because I want pizza. You can have my scraps."

Sam smiled at her. "Thank you for your generosity."

* * *

Sam left the party late. He and Jess had dragged their conversation out for several hours until most of the guests had left. He offered to walk her back to her dorm, but she declined and said she was going back with Rebecca to bunk at their place. She'd see him in the morning.

Sam walked home, a lightness in his step that he hadn't had in a long time. A little thrill of excitement. A little crescent of hope shining in the dark corner of his mind. He had also drunk way too much. It was making him feel loose and silly and loquacious.

He flipped his cell phone open without even registering what he was doing and dialed Dean. Liquor helped him to not over think things. To tamp his mind down a bit.

Dean picked up on the third ring. "Hey."

"Hey," Sam replied. He felt his heart swell at hearing the familiar voice. "My nose bleed stopped."

"Thank god or I think you might be dead by now, Sammy."

Sam placed one sneakered foot down off the curb and started to cross the street. The headlights of a car dazzled him for a moment and it took him a second to get out of the way and back onto the safety of the sidewalk. He blinked. "It's late."

He heard a skeptical edge in Dean's voice. "Thank you Captain Obvious." Then there was a pause with a dawning realization. "Sammy, are you drunk?"

"It's Sam." He insisted stubbornly, as if the topic wasn't open for discussion.

"Yeah, whatever."

Sam squinted and started his loose amble back to the dorm. "No I'm not drunk. I'm a little buzzed..." he slowed his pace a little, feeling that awkward lack of things to say creeping in. Usually he let Dean throw the conversation out like a ball on the floor and it would roll along where Sam took his cue as he watched it bounce. "How is Dad?"

"Why?" Dean's tone was sharp. "You care suddenly?"

"You know what?" Sam shot back, suddenly feeling his emotions spike in defense. "Forget I called. This was a bad idea."

He hung up and put the phone into his pocket, trudging toward his dorm, his good mood suddenly evaporated. Why did Dean always have to do this shit to him? He was so sick of taking the accusations and being quiet about it.

He found himself blinking back tears, his mouth twisting a little. This is why he knew better than to drink too much. He either became irrationally angry or an emotional bitch.

He trudged into the hall, letting the wide double door swing shut behind him with a click. He felt his phone buzz in his pocket. He took it out and stared at it for a moment. Closed his eyes and let out a long breath.

Sam answered. "What?"

"You done with your hissy fit yet?"

Sam's hand tightened on the phone. "I didn't call you to get bitched out over asking how Dad was, okay?"

There was a deep sigh on the other line. Almost in resignation. "What do you want, Sam?"

"Nothing. I'm... I'm calling you back. We got cut off kind of abruptly the other night."

"You were so desperate to get off the phone with me you tried to bleed to death."

Sam blinked. It was a dumb throwaway line meant as a joke but for some reason it stung him a bit. He covered it with a retort. "Be careful, next time I might get dramatic." He leaned his back against the stone wall in the hallway and huffed out a breath. "You know I'm not sure Smurfette was actually a smurf."

"Course she was a smurf. What the hell else would she be?"

"I thought Gargamel created her for some reason."

"He hated smurfs. Why would he make one?"

"I can't remember." Sam furrowed his brow. He swallowed. "I remember so much crap..." he thought of his father passed out drunk on the couch and squeezed his eyes shut. Seemed that was the only way he recalled him most of the time...half in the bag. "But I can't remember about the Smurfs."

Dean paused and then snorted. "Yeah, well its okay, Sammy. No reason to get emotional about it."

Sam blinked. "I'm not emotional about smurfs." He muttered.

He started down the hallway again, his gait felt meandering and he realized he really had had too much to drink. He stopped in the middle of the hall wondering if he should tell Dean about Jessica or keep it close to his vest.

Something, perhaps some honed instinct or maybe his secretive nature, made him decide to bury it in the back of his mind. No good had ever come out of letting people in on something positive he saw on the horizon. Dean would twist it, turn it into a joke when Sam really didn't feel like joking about it at all.

Meeting her had him feeling vulnerable and a bit insecure. His ego couldn't take whatever jab Dean might aim in his direction. Not when the prospect was this new. This unsteady. He wasn't even certain where his friendship with Jessica may lead. She may not even be interested in him.

"Then what are you all emo about, Dude?"

"I'm not emo."

"Sam come on, this is like pullin' teeth. If we're gonna talk then I'm here. Let's talk."

Sam squinted and opened his dorm room. His room mate had obviously been in. Some things were shuffled around.

Sam tripped over a pile of his own dirty laundry and almost fell head first into the wall. He caught himself against the drywall with a thump of his shoulder blade.

"What the hell are you doing?"

"I tripped." Sam picked up the jeans he had fallen over and whipped them angrily into the corner with a whistle snap of flying fabric. "That's what I get for leaving my laundry to build up like this."

"And here I thought you'd be all organized and Martha Stewart on your own."

"I don't always have the extra cash to do it. But this is just...I haven't had time. Working and school and homework. I've let it go..." Sam squeezed his eyes shut. "I've let everything go."

"What the hell does that mean? You flunkin classes or something."

"What? No. I need to keep my grades up or they yank my scholarship."

"Well at least something of yours would be getting yanked."

Sam slapped his forehead. "Really, Dean?"

"Being drunk doesn't take the stick out of your ass, does it?"

Sam bit his lip. "Cause this is... _me_ , Dean."

Dean went silent and Sam could tell he honestly didn't know what to say. "You always wanted me to be different, but this is who I am."

"I like you just fine, Sam. Just wish you'd loosen up a little."

"Yeah." The sound was non-committal. So much he wanted to say but couldn't. He didn't know what to tell Dean. There was so much hurt buried here and he could feel the earth being churned up as he listened to their own voices.

"There's so much fun to be had if you just loosen up."

"I'm pretty sure you have enough 'fun' for both of us."

"Can never have too much of _that,_ Sammy."

"Oh I've seen you with enough hang overs to disagree."

"Worth it."

"Sure it is." Sam sank onto his bed, kicked off his shoes and laid down.

"Pretty little red head in Colorado a few nights ago..." Dean began.

"I thought you were in Wisconsin dealing with a coven."

Dean went silent for a moment. "That was before this."

"What happened anyway?"

"With the redhead?" He deflected, almost predictably. "She liked to-"

"With the coven? You sounded pretty shaken up."

"I'm fine, Sam."

Sam paused, reading what was wrong in the silences between Dean's words.

"Someone die?" He asked.

Dean let out a long trailing breath. "Woman. Dad took it hard."

Sam frowned. "I'm... I'm sorry. He okay.?"

"Self-medicating." Dean responded.

"Of course," Sam replied, unable to keep the biting edge from his voice.

"Hey!" Dean's tone turned sharp with the rebuke. "Lay off him."

"I didn't even say anything."

"You didn't have to."

"So. Dad is shaken up but you're totally fine?"

Dean went silent again and Sam could read _'no. I'm not'_ in the pause.

"I'm fine."

Sam shook his head and closed his eyes. "Of course you are...because of course a woman dying wouldn't affect you at all. I mean...why would it?"

"Shut up, Sam."

"You can talk to me about it, you know. I'm not in the Life anymore...but I know what goes on."

"Bullshit."

"Bullshit?" Sam huffed, disbelieving. "You don't think I know what goes on?"

"You have never been on the front lines like I have!" Dean's voice rose into an emphatic almost shout. "You've never held someone and watched the...the _life_ go out of 'em and known you could have prevented it if only you'da been quicker."

Sam felt that like a punch in the gut. "I don't have to have experienced that in order to know it sucks."

"Yeah," Dean said. "It does suck. But you're in your ivory tower over in Rich Asshole University so I guess it doesn't matter to you anymore."

"Yeah. And you wonder why I wanted out."

He could feel Dean's anger swell on the other side of the phone. "Well you got out. Left me and Dad to deal with this on our own."

"No one is making you do that job, Dean."

"Someone has to do it, Sam."

"Well that someone doesn't have to be us." Sam replied heatedly.

"You're such a selfish asshole you know that?"

Sam's jaw tightened and he felt his hand crush around the cell phone. "You know, Dean, you keep saying that but I don't think not wanting to see people disemboweled on a regular basis qualifies as me being selfish."

"Yeah. Of course you wouldn't think that."

Sam's nose scrunched as he drew his brows together in anger. "Is this how it's gonna be with us, huh?"

"Is what gonna be like what?"

"We're either going to talk to each other like strangers and dance around what we really want to say or else we're going to be at each other's throats over me going to Stanford. There's no middle ground to meet on here?"

"I don't even know what you're talking about."

Sam closed his eyes. "Of course you don't. You know, I hoped maybe two years would give you enough time to cool out about me leaving but I guess not."

"You're gone. Whether it's been one month or two years or ten. You still left us, Sam."

Sam closed his eyes, suddenly on the verge of tears. He tried to swallow the lump in his throat and blinked rapidly. "If...if you're going to bitch at me about leaving every time we talk from now on...maybe..." his voice broke off. He bit it back before he completed the sentence.

"Maybe what?"

Sam drew a deep breath. "Then maybe you should lose my number."

Dean went dead quiet. Sam could tell his words had hit him like a physical blow.

Dean finally spoke, all hurt anger. "You know what, Sam. Stay with your little rich friends. Pretend to be one of them. I don't care. I'll stay here where I belong."

Sam felt their stretched over burdened bond starting to tear. It hurt him somewhere in his chest. "Can't we just..."

"Just what, Sam? Pretend it never happened? Pretend we have anything in common."

"Pretend to be a functional family for once!"

"No families are functional. They're all fucked up once you scratch the surface."

"We don't even _have_ a surface to scratch!" Sam blurted out, no longer measuring his words. "Dammit Dean. Just let me go. Let me do what I have to do."

"I'm letting you go alright." He could hear the tightness in Dean's voice. "Have... have a nice life, Sam."

"Dean...I..." Sam paused, felt his lower lip tremble. This was a losing battle. They'd both lost. He swallowed the lump in his throat. "Yeah. You too, buddy."

The other line went dead.

Sam tried not to cry.

He didn't make it long.

 **Thanks for the reviews, guys. Please leave one if you have the time. It makes me keep writing. And thanks to Dom Darkwolf for her smurfs knowledge. LOL**


	19. Chapter 19

Sam surveyed the wreckage of the dorm room. Brady and Jessica hadn't been exaggerating with their claims that the pipes had burst spectacularly. The floorboards were warped. The walls were stained with water that had begun to rot the cheap plasterboard.

Sam looked to Jessica. "What the hell happened?"

She shrugged and tossed her hands into the air. "The pipes burst?"

"Burst or exploded?" Sam stared in horror.

He and his father and brother had squatted in their share of empty buildings. They'd experienced remnants of pipes bursting in the cold when trying to get by in abandoned houses with no utilities. Those were usually up North. In harsh climates.

Jess cocked her head and gave him her dimpled smile. "Exploded. I forgot to tell you I build pipe bombs."

Sam smiled. "Oh, good. I like dangerous friends."

"So..." she dropped her eyes to the ground shyly and traced a toe over one of the distressed floor boards. "You have the honor of being the only person who didn't bail on me for today."

Sam raised an eyebrow. "Really?"

She gave him a girlish shrug. She was wearing a crop top with wide boatneck that draped off one shoulder. Sam was having a hard time keeping his eyes off of the smooth cream skin. "Yeah." She looked up at him from under her lashes.

"Brady?" Sam inquired.

"Bailed this morning."

Sam shook his head and couldn't stop his eye roll. "Typical anymore."

"But..." Jess swept her long blonde waves back into an elastic band as she spoke. "That means you get ALL the pizza I don't eat. So not all is lost."

Sam flashed her a wide grin. Jessica didn't know him well enough to appreciate how very rare they were on Sam Winchester.

"Not at all," he said.

* * *

Moving Jess' stuff down the hallway turned out to be a logistical pain in the ass, with both of them attempting to wrestle a few cumbersome pieces through a narrow doorway, but Sam found himself enjoying doing it with her.

Eventually her roommate, Rose, joined in for about a half hour before she left again. Sam had found himself thoroughly enjoying being the only male amongst the female attention. Dean would have harassed him about it mercilessly if he'd known. If he'd been there.

The thought wandered through his mind that there would be no Dean to harass him after that last phone call. He was set loose.

Sam tried to convince himself he was fine with it. Most of him was fine with the freedom from his family entanglements, but part of him missed the yoke.

Jess leaned over to toss a used box from the grocery store laden with belongings onto her mattress. It made a jangling clink. Sam entered behind her with a chair under one shoulder and a duffle bag of crap clutched in his other hand. With all the moving he and his brother had done over the years, he was efficient at carrying odds and ends.

The boxes and bags were nothing. It had been getting her heavy wooden dresser through the doorway earlier that had proven challenging.

Sam let his gaze flick appreciatively over Jessica's backside as she bent over to shove the box against the wall. Her jeans fit her like a second skin. His mind went to a dirty visual and he pulled it back to the present as he set down her chair and tossed the duffle down.

Jess flopped onto the bed. It made a squeak of springs. "Oh my god. My back aches." She stretched her arms. "You okay there, Sam? You did all the heavy lifting."

Sam nodded. "I'm fine. I make a good beast of burden."

He sat on the chair he'd been carrying to take a breather and looked shyly at her through his lashes.

She met his gaze and her demeanor sobered a little. They shared a long charged look between them before Jess cleared her throat.

"You hungry? I think it may be pizza time."

"Yeah." Sam said slowly. "I'm really hungry."

"Okay, so what pizza place? You okay with _Phil's?_ "

 _"Phil's_ is great." Sam responded.

Jess flipped open her cell phone. "I have them on speed dial..." she looked up. "That's kind of sad, actually."

One side of Sam's lip lifted in a smirk. "Me too."

She laughed. "Seriously?"

"I'm not joking. I don't cook anything but Ramen." He gave an amused huff through his nose and then looked toward the window as she dialed and ordered a pizza with everything on it. The sunlight dappled through the shadow cast by trees and buildings.

She snapped the phone shut.

"Sam?"

He pulled himself back to reality. "Yeah."

"You look pensive. What's up?"

He shrugged. "Just thinking that I'm not used to the constant sun here."

She cocked her head with a raised eyebrow. "Haven't you been here for like 2 years?"

"Yeah."

"Still not adjusted? Where did you live... a cave?"

He snorted. "May as well have. I'm just...It's weird to think it's warm here when half the US is plunged in snow."

"We're lucky." She smiled.

"Yeah." He replied, gaze turned inward for a moment.

"You left behind people in the snow, huh?"

Once again, she understood his unspoken thoughts. She was good at it. Unnervingly good.

Sam bit his lip. "Yeah."

Jess seemed fluent in the double entendre they were speaking in. "You know, there's no shame in getting out of a bad situation."

She'd caught him out.

Sam turned his head; his hair fell into his eyes. "Aren't you supposed to stay behind and help though?"

"Well not if they _want_ to be in the situation. Then all you do is ruin your life trying to save people who can't be saved."

 _'Not everyone wants to be saved. Save them anyway.'_ Dad's refrain floated through his head.

Sam's mood had sunk.

Jessica noticed immediately.

"Hey." She stood up, and god, she was _beautiful._ Her face all framed in that glorious golden hair, which had fallen out of her haphazard pony tail in wisps. "You can help me figure out where my stuff goes."

"I flunked out of interior design."

"Use your instincts." She grabbed a poster and unrolled it. "So... does the _Pink Floyd_ poster go here..." she stood on the bed and held it to the side. Sam couldn't help his attention wandering to the slight bit of bared midriff exposed when she stretched. "Or here." She moved it to the head of the bed, bouncing as the walked and stretching out to hold it against the wall.

Sam laughed. "I think we should figure out where the dresser goes first."

"No. _Pink Floyd._ Then the dresser."

"This sounds like my brother's line of reasoning."

"Just one thing to make it feel like home and then we put in the big stuff."

"Well, then I vote for the head of the bed."

"Okay." She turned to face him, still holding the sheet of unrolled paper pressed against the wall.

Sam stood up and routed around for a hammer.

"Tape will do for now." Jess told him.

"If we're gonna do it," he said, lifting random papers and objects, knowing he brought in a small cache of tools earlier in a little red box. "We should tack it up right. Saves us going back in later and cleaning up." Sam was aware that in that moment that he sounded like his father. "Bingo."

He found a little tack hammer and a plastic box with a few nails in it. He grabbed it and walked over to the side of the bed.

He didn't have to stand on it to stretch and drive the tack in with a few taps, but to reach the other side he had to step up. Jess furrowed her brow and adjusted the poster so that it was level. She moved a bit out of Sam's way, her weight shifting the mattress under his feet. He tacked a second tiny nail in and then finished the bottom. One tack on each of the four corners.

He nodded and looked over to her. "There. Nice and sturdy."

Jess was in close proximity. They paused, almost nose to nose and Sam felt the tension again. A pull, almost magnetic in its attraction.

He backed up a step and his weight shifted the springs beneath her feet and made her lurch uneasily forward as she struggled to keep her balance. She banged into him and Sam fell back into the wall, her with him.

He dropped the little tack hammer onto the mattress and reached with his hand to catch himself. There was the tearing sound of paper beneath his outstretched palm and Sam felt her weight on his chest as she yelped and then righted herself. He withdrew his hand in horror.

The poster gaped with the rip he'd put into it.

He grimaced. "Oh shit. I'm sorry."

They both looked at the torn black poster.

Jess started to laugh.

"Okay." She said when she'd stopped. "Maybe we should have started with the furniture after all. Where's the tape?"

They repaired the torn poster with some clear tape. Jessica held the torn paper together like she was performing field surgery and mended it with a stripe of sticky cellophane. It didn't blend well, the repaired part was obvious, the light gleaming off the smooth surface of the clear tape. Jess didn't seem to mind.

They sat down for pizza and Sam thought to himself that if she could overlook the torn and patched poster, maybe she wouldn't mind the torn and patched pieces of himself.

 **Thanks for the reviews! Please send more! XOXO. Michele, tell Phil he has his own Pizza Place now.**


	20. Chapter 20

Sam felt like a broken thing next to Jessica. She was like a light shining against an old rolled glass window pane and illuminating all the drafty cracks and every bit where the glass bubbled and then smoothed out.

Something about her being distinctly _unbroken_ made him feel older. He'd always felt older than his peers. He _was_ older than his peers in some ways, he knew. There was always something that set him apart, made him feel worn and separate and _Other_ in a way he could never articulate. Maybe it was his tumultuous youth- tossed around from school to school, state to state, squatting in abandoned houses and shitty motel rooms. Maybe it was the knowledge he possessed that things that go bump in the night could kill you. That the boogie man and tales of monsters were all too real in his world. But maybe it was merely him. Something inside _him_ that was dark and tarnished and didn't feel _right_ somehow.

College confused him at times. It was a respite, a sanctuary for him where he could be surrounded by normal people with normal lives and sometimes he could feel that way too. Like a kid... like a young man with his life just beginning and his prospects open and unlimited. Life was full of choice. Choices that he'd never been allowed when he'd had his father pulling the reins.

It was fantastic.

But then, at times, he felt so battered and world weary next to their shine. So out of place and like he was masquerading, trying to cover himself with a mask, lest they glimpse the real Sam Winchester and recoil in horror at the scars within.

So Jessica's pure unbridled enthusiasm stood in counterpoint to his natural world weary reserve. Jess made him feel broken. Yet she made him feel...whole? She made him feel like she knew his rough edges and that his window pane had bubbles in the wavy glass and she didn't seem to mind. Her sunshine shone through anyway, danced right through those imperfections and cast a light within.

Sam was thinking of that as Jess stared up at him with her incredible smile, a white paper bag clutched in one hand. All white teeth and that wild mane of blonde hair that he wanted to tangle his fingers in...he reined his thoughts back. They were hard to control when she moved, lithe and tall and long. God help him when she was wearing tight jeans.

Even though her physical appeal was borderline intoxicating, it was simply being with her that ensnared him the most.

The day he'd helped her move, they'd spent the entire day together. The following afternoon she'd called him on the pretext of having someone help her rearrange a few pieces of furniture, which she decided against after he'd dragged her bed to a different location and she made him move it back. He didn't mind. He didn't mind at all.

The day after that she'd asked him if he wanted to go to lunch and when he told her he was working in the library, she showed up while he was stacking books with a sandwich from the cafe down the street.

She smiled up at him. "I thought you told me you worked in the bookstore."

"I do sometimes," he said, balancing on a rung of a aluminum ladder. "But they were short-handed here so I'm covering. They kinda float me around and use me where they need me."

Sam blinked and registered what she was carrying. He looked down from his high vantage point, shoved a book onto the highest shelf, and smiled at her. Then he hopped down, happier to see her face then just about anyone's he could remember. Ever. It was a feeling of almost giddy joy that he wasn't used to.

"Thought you'd be hungry." She said, handing him the white paper bag. "Got you a ham on rye. Hope you don't mind pickles."

Sam smiled warmly, eyes lit with affection. "I don't mind at all."

Jess edged around him and climbed the ladder, easily and gracefully.

Jessica craned her neck back to look at the worn spines of old hard bound books.

"Careful up there," Sam admonished, putting a hand on the aluminum side to steady her and trying to ignore the allure of that curvaceous ass near his left cheek.

She climbed back down until she was standing on the bottom rung and they were standing nose to nose. "There, Sam. Now we're even heights. Bet you never had a girl as tall as you." She teased, leaning in playfully and hooking her arm around the side of the ladder.

"It is unique." he said, her breath on his face. Something was charged in the air. A sense of expectancy.

They were so close. Sam dropped his sandwich bag on the edge of a shelf and put his hand tenderly in that soft scented hair he'd dreamt about. He leaned in tentatively and she made no move to escape. He brushed his lips against hers and when she didn't protest, he kissed her in earnest. His heart sped up and his legs almost felt weak with the force of it.

He pulled away, flushing boyishly, almost a bit embarrassed by his lapse in judgement. At the inappropriateness of making out in the library...at his _job_ no less.

He could almost hear Dean's approval in his head. _"Atta boy. Strike while the iron is hot, Sammy."_

Sam cleared his throat. "I'm sorry." He said, turning away and grabbing his bag of lunch. "I should probably go put this in the back before I get yelled at for having food near the rare books...and making out in the Philosophy Section."

Jess jumped down, glowing with that irrepressible spirit of hers. "What better place to do it?"

He stood there, unsure of what to say or do.

"I can't think of a better first kiss than in front of," she turned around and pulled a book. _"A Vindication on the Rights of Women."_

Sam smiled, dimples appearing at the words 'first kiss.' She was letting him know there'd be a second. And third. Hopefully _ad nauseum._

He turned around and placed a finger on a book near his shoulder. _Essays On Morality._

"Socrates might disagree with this behavior."

Jessica wrinked her nose. "Fuck Socrates. Mary Wollstonecraft for the win."

Sam laughed and knew deep in his heart that this must be what it felt like to fall in love.

 **I apologize for the slow updates. I've been having some health issues interfering with my writing addiction. Fuck them! ;) PLease throw me a review. Thank you!**


	21. Chapter 21

The Demon Brady cocked his head as he saw Jessica Moore heading out of class. A wolfish, predatory smile crossed his handsome features and he let his eyes trace the curves of that _fantastic_ ass. God, it was a work of art. Those long legs that went for miles, those curves. Part of him was jealous that Sam Winchester would soon be hitting that if all went according to plan. He'd kept quiet tabs on the two of them. He'd known they were falling hard and fast. Only few weeks since Sam had helped Jess move furniture around and already he'd spotted them together several times.

Brady walked up behind her, let himself appreciate that figure for one more minute and then arranged his face into his customary 'Tyson Brady' expression as he called her name. "Hey, Moore, hold up."

She turned to look at him, a smile lighting up her features. She tucked her book under one arm and gave him a quick hug. "Hey."

"You get situated in the new dorm room?"

"Yeah, no thanks to you." She rolled her eyes.

"Hey, I was sick. Trust me. You didn't want what I had." What he'd had was a bag of blow and two coke-addled strippers. She didn't have to know that. On second thought she probably didn't _want_ that either. So in a way he was telling the truth.

"It's alright." Jess responded in her usual easy-going manner. "Sam came through."

"Sam always comes through." Brady told her, keeping pace.

"He seems like that kinda guy."

"He is." Brady responded. He shouldered into her, flirtatiously. "Hey, let's go hang in the lounge. You got time?"

She appraised him and then nodded. "Yeah."

They headed down the hallway, Jess shouldering her little purse to one side. It bumped her hip as she walked.

"Why the hell do you girls keep purses? What do you put in there?" He asked, eyeing the faux leather.

"Oh the usual. Lipstick. Tampons. Severed heads." Jess opened the door to the lounge and Brady brushed by her with a laugh.

"That's a small purse. Must be shrunken heads." He thought to himself what a beautiful thing shrunken heads were. How full of ingenuity.

"Oh no," Jess replied cooly, letting the door click shut behind her. "Not the whole head. I only keep the ears."

The lounge had several chairs and desks, and a pool table. She set her stuff down. "Wanna shoot a game?" She asked.

Brady nodded to her and walked over to the soda machine in the corner. He pulled out a few dollars and fed them into the slot. He grabbed himself a Dr. Pepper. He liked the burn.

He looked over to Jessica who was racking up the shot, those beautiful tits almost touching the table, her hair trailing against the green velvet as she leaned over. "What do you want to drink?"

"Coke," she replied, moving the plastic triangle. The balls made a rattle as she set them inside one by one.

The machine clicked as it dropped the cold cans in the dispenser.

He glanced up at her casually and popped the tab on his. It made a hiss. "Where is Sam today anyway. I haven't seen him in a week. He's always out."

She looked up at him and he saw her flush a little. Her dimples showed as she pressed her lips together. "I think he's got work."

Brady approached and handed her the soda. Jess took it in her elegant hand and straightened up.

"Well," he looked her up and down. "You look...guilty, Miss Moore."

Her eyes slid away. "I'm pretty sure he likes me."

He raised an eloquent eyebrow. "Who wouldn't."

She shook her head. "You're such a flirt." Jess looked up at him. "He's so quiet. Shy almost."

Brady picked a pool cue from the rack on the wall and eyed it to see if it was straight. "Yep. That's Sam."

He watched her rub the chalk on the end of her pool cue. The blue dust rising from the action dotting the back of her hand, marring it's pristine whiteness.

"He's had it rough so I think it's made him a bit reserved."

Jess looked up. "Oh?"

Bingo. He had her hooked. Now he just had to reel her in slowly, slowly lest she get away. Leave a trail of breadcrumbs for her to follow... Paint the picture of his messed up childhood. His struggles. Catnip for women. God, how they loved broken, fucked up men. Morons.

"Yeah. He doesn't talk much about himself."

"No. He doesn't."

"Sam's a good guy. A really good guy." Brady shook his head and lined up the shot. "He doesn't deserve the life he's had."

She cleared her throat. "He told me his mom died in a fire."

"Yeah. And his Dad went a little crazy and became an alcoholic." Brady's cue clicked against the cue ball and knocked it into a striped six. He sank it into the quarter pocket. "Didn't treat Sam so well."

Jess' eyes went soft. "Poor Sam."

"I think his Dad blamed him for his mother's death."

"What? Why?"

"She was in his nursery when the fire broke out."

"But he was a baby!"

Brady shrugged. "Doesn't matter much, Jess. People need someone to blame when bad things happen."

He waved a finger at her. "Now don't go telling Sam I told you this shit."

She rolled her eyes. "I'm not an asshole, Brady. I'm not gonna rat you out. Give me some credit."

Oh, he did. That's why he was feeding her this shit. She'd never breathe a word of it to Sam.

"Sam's a hard worker too. You know, people like me, I got my family to help me out...but Sam. Well, he's on his own. He didn't even have anywhere to go for Christmas."

Jess looked scandalized. "What? Nowhere?"

"His dad...his brother...I mean who doesn't want to see their family for the holidays? Sam doesn't seem to feel like he can go back to them."

Brady shrugged and took another shot. He sent several balls careening around. Sank another stripe and then scratched as the cue ball disappeared into a pocket.

Jess reached down to grab it, set it behind the dot and lined up her shot. "You think... I mean be honest with me, Brady. I know he's your best friend but don't lie for him. Would he be good for me? Would we be good together? Is he gonna break my heart?"

 _No, baby,_ Brady thought. _You're gonna break his._

"I think you'd be great for him. I think you'll set his world on fire." Brady gave her a wide smile.

Jess took her shot and stood up to watch the balls spin. A solid yellow pinged off the side, headed for the corner pocket and just barely knocked into the red ball. The red ball bumped it off course. "I really, really like him," she said. "I think I could fall hard for him if I'm not careful." The yellow switched trajectory and slammed into the black ball. Jess watched in horror as the eight ball rolled up to the lip of the pocket.

It teetered there a moment and then sank.

 **Thanks for the reviews everybody!**


	22. Chapter 22

Sam casually leaned his elbows against the railing of Zach and Rebecca's back patio and tilted his head back to look up at the night sky. The stars dotted the blackness. Little bits of light thrown against the dark, all burning themselves out. Some already had. Thousands of galaxies besides this one. He was one speck on one planet. What did his life matter at all?

He thought of Dean.

He heard Jess join him on the porch and turned around. She had a beer in her hand. She was apartment sitting for the two siblings. Zach and Rebecca were out of town for the weekend.

His eyes tracked her and he smiled. "Hey."

"Hi." Their little group of friends had finally gone home. Brady had been the last to clear out. "What are you doing on the patio?"

He shrugged. "Needed some air."

She cocked her head and took a sip of beer. This was the first chance they'd had to be alone since the kiss in the library.

Sam felt awkward. He wasn't sure where he stood with her. He knew she'd enjoyed it, but he suddenly felt shy and out of place and so confused about what he was feeling.

"You have a hard time socializing." She said, still studying him.

Sam ducked his head and gave a quick flash of teeth...not quite a grin. Almost a grimace. "I'm that transparent, huh?"

She smiled at him. "Yeah. You're pretty transparent."

He looked away.

"You just..." she tilted her head again. "You shrink when you're in a crowd. You're this big guy but you just kinda, shut down."

"I kinda...I'm used to avoiding drawing attention."

"Why?"

"New kid at school all the time. We just...we moved so much I tried to just keep my head down and fit in." He snorted. "My brother chose the opposite path."

She grinned. "Stood out, huh?"

"He tried to be a pain in the ass everywhere we went. He'd swagger in late, give the teachers attitude. Dean was the bad boy." He shook his head with an almost smile, set his lips to his beer.

"Which method worked?"

Sam thought about it. "Neither I guess... I mean Dean got in more fights than me. He never lost them though."

"Did you?"

Sam turned his back to her, looked out over the yard. "I didn't like to fight. I could if I had to though."

He felt really maudlin tonight for some reason. Maybe the company just had left him a little drained. Or the amount of hours he was working. Or the truck he'd glimpsed outside earlier that reminded him distinctly of his father's. God. He was so angry still. At both of them. He felt so...rejected.

Jess was at his back. He almost startled when he felt her hand on his shoulder blade. "What's wrong, Sam?"

He swallowed. "Nothing."

"Oh, come on. Give me a little credit. You're easy to read, remember?"

He let out a small huff of breath through his nose. "I think I'm just a little tired and overworked this week."

She went quiet and Sam turned around to look at that pretty face. Felt his heart accelerate with it. In a flash of insight, he _knew_ what his problem was. He was frightened. All his life Sam Winchester had _never_ gotten what he wanted. Ever. But here he was. At Stanford. He'd attained one piece of the puzzle. It had cost him. Come at a huge cost that he hadn't quite anticipated. He had expected his father to be angry, certainly- but that blow out had topped anything he'd ever imagined. John had been furious. They'd both been furious. All the pent up anger and frustration built up over years and years of hardship had exploded in one fracturing moment.

In the end, Sam had gotten what he'd wanted but he'd traded Dean and his Dad in the bargain.

And now here like the answer to a whispered prayer stood Jessica Moore. She wasn't just a potential girlfriend. Sam had dated before. This woman...this woman was the whole package. A vivacious, intelligent, passionate creature who somehow understood him. Somehow knew what made him tick. And she was wrapped in a package so blindingly beautiful his breath caught at it. Here she was. She was right here for him to claim. All he had to do was dive in.

The prospect terrified him. Because John Winchester had taught him through example what losing something that meant so much did to a man.

Because Sam Winchester _never_ got what he wanted without a price. Ever. Something deep in his gut told him that this would be the same old refrain. That there was some price to pay. That this was too good to be true. And what seemed too good to be true usually was.

Good things didn't happen to Winchesters.

Sam didn't let the thought of loss slip into his conscious mind often. He tried to keep it buried under layers of control but as he looked at Jess he somehow felt the loss before their love affair had truly begun.

"You think kissing me was a mistake?" Jess asked him pointedly, looking almost nervous to voice it.

"What?" Sam asked. "God, no!"

She gave him a flirtatious lift of her full lips. "Then why are you feeling sorry for yourself out here and not doin' it again?" She set her beer bottle on the wooden railing.

Sam drew a breath, leaned in and kissed her.

He was lost. He knew it the minute their lips locked. She felt right in a way that no other woman had before. And suddenly he felt very vulnerable.

The surge of male hormones hadn't flooded his brain yet with that first kiss...instead it was a sorrow that filled him until he broke away, blinking back tears.

"Sam," Jessica said gently.

He leaned in again and kissed her properly before she could see his face. He tangled his hands in that hair, explored her mouth with his own and felt his body rise to it. Jess' arms went around his neck. She made a contented little sound that made his stomach flip. My God it was sexy.

He lost himself in the feel of her. She was exquisite. Soft and feminine and she smelled so goddamned good.

He parted her lips with his own and their tongues met for a moment before Jess came up for air. "That's more like it," she giggled.

He leaned his head against her forehead, his breathing quicker.

She took his hand. "Come on inside."

They walked into the kitchen and Sam stood awkwardly a minute before she leaned into him and initiated another kiss. He bent down and angled his head, tasting her lips, her teeth, her tongue. He pulled away, breathing heavily, holding her arms. She looked up at him.

"Jess... you mean something to me and I..." he swallowed, looking into her eyes, unused to laying his emotions out this plain on the table.

"You mean something to me too." She told him.

He almost wanted to tell her that he wanted to take it slow. But that was bullshit. He wanted to rush headlong in to it. He also wanted to keep her at arm's length. But that wasn't going to work. This woman deserved all of him.

He gave his shy, Sam smile, all dimples and charm. "Good...I gotta say I'm gonna feel a little weird shacking up at Zach and Rebecca's while they're gone. If that's where this is leading." He paused. "Is that where this is leading?"

"Is that where you want it to lead?" She asked coyly.

He ducked his head again and snorted. "Kinda." He looked at her from under his mop of bangs.

Jess smirked. "Well too bad," she said dismissively. "You just have to wait then. I'm apartment sitting."

Sam laughed.

 **Thank you for the reviews. They keep the muse happy!**


	23. Chapter 23

Sam thumbed open his textbook and settled into the desk in the lecture hall. They were always too small for him and he had to splay his legs awkwardly out in front of him. He was breathing heavily from his mad dash through campus. Sometimes getting to places on time was difficult without a car. A green pulp of mulched grass fell onto the page and Sam noticed that his tan arms, glistening with a fine sheen of sweat, had bits and pieces of lawn stuck to them. He hadn't had time to change after his landscaping job. He felt awful showing up to class sweaty and probably smelling like gas-powered lawn mower fumes so he'd taken a seat in the back of the lecture hall away from as many people as he could. He brushed the grass clippings onto the floor and thought about how hungry he was. And now tired.

His vision swam for a moment as he tried to pull focus on the text. The band-aid on his forearm scraped against the book edge and started bleeding again, judging by the widening red stain. This morning he'd nicked himself on the brush trimmer and the worried old lady client insisted on covering it with a large adhesive strip. Sam had gone back to work and didn't have time to tend to it before class.

He noticed a speck of blood ping onto the table and Sam blinked, examining his arm. It took him a minute to register that the blood wasn't from his lawn care wound. He felt something warm and wet on his upper lip. It was a damn nose bleed.

He blinked and stood up, trying to keep crouched down so his tall form didn't block anyone's view as he worked his way toward the exit to use the bathroom.

The professor gave him a cursory nod as he left. He wandered into the hall in time for a blinding wave of pain to lance through his head. He winced and pushed his hand against his temple, staggered over to the wall and sagged against its immovable strength.

He stayed there, bracing his weight on his elbow, teeth gritted, waiting for the pain to abate. Instead, he got a flash of Dean's face illuminated by flame as he wrestled Sam away from the inferno.

His heart sped up. Was Dean okay? And then the movie reel in his mind unspooled and he was standing in Stanford once more.

Sam hurried to the bathroom, grabbed a wad of tissue from a toilet roll and stanched the bleeding. It ebbed to a stop finally and he sighed with relief, ran his hands under some cool water, then splashed it on his face. He looked up at himself. He looked terrible, sweaty, dirty, his bangs awry. He just had to power through class and get some sleep.

He headed back to sociology, still tired, and sat down-a little shaky from not having had time to eat. The topic was disadvantaged youth in modern society. Sam scratched down his notes, feeling his body tense as they moved into alcoholism. How it affected the family. The kids became defensive, withdrawn, combative or unable to express emotion. _Para-alcoholics_...a disease, a pathology somehow bestowed upon a family member even when they'd never taken a sip of alcohol.

Sam's shoulders tightened.

There was the message. Again and again. You can't be normal if your parent drank. Damaged goods. Tainted. Doomed to fail. An impossible cycle to escape.

Sam raised his hand.

The professor nodded in his direction. "Mr. Winchester."

"This sounds to me as if it's essentially giving the message to people who have had to deal with a parent with alcoholism that you can't be functional if it's touched your past."

The professor paused and raised an eyebrow. "That isn't essentially what the studies are saying though, Sam. Statistically you are unlikely to remain unaltered by such an experience."

"Have they ever bothered looking into how the message we're given affects the people learning it? If you tell people they have no chance, does that affect how they go about their lives? Does it affect what they think they're capable of? I'd argue that it does."

The professor stepped up in front of his desk and looked and Sam's face.

He snorted. "Are you and child of an alcoholic, Sam?"

Sam's jaw tightened a little. "I'm not certain how that is relevant."

"I would say your questioning of this discourse shows that it's quite relevant to you."

Sam wasn't thrown off his stride. When his mind was set to verbal debate, he knew where he was going. It drove his father and Dean, neither who were particularly verbally dexterous, crazy. "I would say with the way the studies are set up- there is a bias that they are written with. They pathologize character traits that most people have; there's no way to win. If I sit back and listen to the information and take it as fact, then I'm accepting my role as a scapegoat. If I challenge the information like I'm doing now then I'm a Para-alcoholic reacting defensively to new information. If I withdraw socially and take in information before adding my own input, then I'm a people pleaser reacting based off my victimhood status. If I jump into debate right away and do my own thing, then I'm antisocial and a rebel looking to defend my ego." Sam was just winding up. "So ironically, the study of disenfranchised social groups further disenfranchises them by: One..." he raised his finger, "putting it in their mind that they most likely can't rise above their birth circumstances. And two..." he held up another finger, "it sets up _society's_ expectations that they can't either. How does this affect employers? How about people entering relationships?"

The professor blinked and laughed dryly. "Well I'd say you're definitely showing how relevant your past is just in that selection of statements."

 _That's it?_ Sam thought. _That's his answer? I'm thinking this way because I'm a child of an alcoholic?  
_

"My questions aren't relevant then?" Sam countered.

"Oh they're relevant. It's just that you aren't capable of seeing things objectively, so engaging in discourse with someone who has a vested interest in the subject is counterproductive."

"So my questions are dismissed because I'm the child of an alcoholic."

"I'm not dismissing them. I'm just doubting the efficacy of discussing it because of who you are."

"Thus demonstrating my point, Prof Beek. Dismissing what I say because of who I am is an ad hominem attack, by the way."

Sam saw the expression shift from open amusement at Sam's impertinence to annoyance at having his authority questioned. "Would you like to teach the class, Mr. Winchester?"

"No, sir." Sam shrank a little at the rebuke. He should have kept his mouth shut. But he was sick of every class telling him he couldn't succeed because of who he was. It was bullshit. He felt invisible. Deflated.

* * *

Sam limped back to his dorm. He needed a Tylenol and a drink. Open beer bottles weren't allowed on campus but he didn't care about the fucking rules right now. Must be from his para-alcoholism, he thought bitterly.

He felt a text ping in on his phone. It was Jess.

 _:Hey? Wanna meet at Zach and Rebeccas? I made cookies.:_

He paused, torn. He could take a nap there he supposed. He looked like hell but he had long ago mastered 4 minute showers. He could pause in the communal bathroom and freshen up, change clothes, without it hardly delaying him at all. He unlocked his dorm room, grabbed a new set of clothes and headed back out.

* * *

"Hey!" Jess greeted him with a happy smile when he walked through the door.

"Hi." He said tiredly, his face brightening for a second when he saw her.

"Oh, Sam." She studied him. "What's wrong?"

"I'm so tired," he said. "I hope you aren't looking for conversation." He flopped himself down at the kitchen table. "Do they have beer?"

Jess got some out of the fridge and slid the bottle to him. He could smell chocolate chip cookies on the air. He shook his head, his hair still damp.

"You've been working like a dog," She said. "Haven't seen you all week."

"I know. I'm sorry."

Jess sat down across from him and her gaze settled on his forearm. The band-aid had peeled off in the shower and the jagged cut that ran down from his elbow was on display. He saw Jess' eyes light on it.

"Oh Sam! What did you do?"

He frowned and twisted his arm to peer at it. "Um. I weed whacked my arm hair."

"Jeez." She stood up and disappeared into the bathroom.

Sam heard her open the medicine cabinet and rummage around. "It's gonna get infected if you leave it." She told him from the other room

He sighed, looked up at her with puppy eyes as she came back out with supplies. "Jess. I'm okay. Really."

"You are not." She sat down and carefully took his wrist and rotated it, he winced a little. "Jeez, Sam. This is really bad."

"It's not that bad," he told her, studying it himself dispassionately.

She dabbed at it with a cotton ball and peroxide. The formula made made a fizzing sound as it bubbled against the open wound.

Sam winced a little.

"Stings?" She asked.

"Yeah." He grimaced.

She slathered Neosporin on it and covered it with a gauze pad and some tape. Then got up and tossed the trash under the sink before she washed her hands.

"You're danger prone. My mom used to lecture me about being danger prone when I skinned my knees as a Kid. I was always falling off my stupid bike. I had one of those pink ones with the dumb as pom poms on the handle bars." She wiped her hands on the striped barcloth hanging on the cupboard. "You know moms."

Sam bit his lip and said nothing. He had no point of reference. No bike as a child and no mom to tend his wounds.

Jessica took the plate of chocolate chip cookies off the stove and set them down in front of him with her sweet smile.

Sam's breath caught at it and he had to blink back a sudden surge of tears. She grabbed one, not noticing and munched on it, nibbling around the chips. "I always like the chips better than the dough...mom would be mad because I left half the cookie uneaten. Anyway I wanted to make you a batch."

She looked up at him, her mouth full. A crumb of chocolate on one of her pouty lips. She studied his expression and swallowed. "Hey. What's wrong? Don't you like chocolate chip?"

"I love chocolate chip." He replied, his gaze falling to the plate of cookies. He reached out and snagged one, held it between his fingers before he took a bite. It was really good. He wasn't sure he'd ever had freshly baked cookies, except that one time he and Dean grabbed the ready-made Pillsbury log of dough to cut up and throw in Bobby's ancient oven. They'd managed to burn them and piss Bobby off when they set off the smoke alarm.

 _Bobby._

 _Dean._

Sam teared up again and tried to blink it back down.

Jess cocked her head. "Sam. Hey, what's wrong?"

He averted his gaze, throat tight with the effort of keeping a rein on his emotion.

"The cookies that bad?" She joked.

He snorted a laugh. "No one has ever baked me cookies before." His voice was soft.

She brushed her hair behind her shoulder and said nothing. But he saw the hesitancy in her eyes. Was she wondering just how damaged he was?

Maybe the sociology professor was right. Maybe there was something irreversibly broken about him. Something spoiled and irreparable. Maybe normalcy was going to hurt as much as the abnormal had. Maybe _more_ because Sam wasn't used to it. Would never be. Would try to sabotage any happiness because he didn't deserve it.

He sat quietly...warring with himself.

"I can bake more where this came from you know." She joked. "It's just cookies." Jess elbowed him on the shoulder. Sam went with the motion then took a swig of his beer.

"I'm not usually like this. I'm just so...tired." he replied. "I'm really...overwhelmed at the moment."

"Okay," Jess replied. "That's obvious. Maybe you should sack out on the couch and get some sleep."

"I'm kinda big for the couch." He countered.

"If you scrunch up you'll fit."

"Jess...thanks for the cookies." He said softly.

She turned and looked at him. "You're welcome."

He traced a cookie before him absently with his pointer finger before he finally committed to taking it. "They really are good."

"I'm a good baker. Not the best chef but I'll cook the hell out of a pie."

"If only my brother heard you say that." Sam choked up again and berated himself mentally for being a fucking moron. He squeezed the bridge of his nose and swallowed.

He could feel Jessica's concerned eyes on him. He was probably scaring her a little. "Dean isn't...nothing bad happened to him recently, right?" She asked hesitantly.

"Yeah." Sam replied still managing to keep the tears at bay. "He's fine. We just haven't spoken in a while."

He breathed out slowly and took another cookie. He ate it in a few bites. "These are really good." He said finally mastering himself.

"You can talk to me, you know.: She told him.

He nodded, unsure if he could trust his voice. He looked away from her, knowing he really couldn't talk to anyone about his past. Ever. That it was his burden to carry. His secret to keep.

"Sam." Jessica took his hand.

"Jess." He closed his eyes. "Please..."

He ached so badly. Everything ached. His heart. His body. His mind.

Her delicate hands squeezed his fingers. "It's okay."

He nodded and swallowed hard.

"I'm sorry. I didn't mean to set you off."

"What?" Sam asked. "No. You didn't. My whole day is just... I've been working a lot." He decided to open up with what he could. "And I was in class and we were talking about alcoholism and it just made me think about my dad. "

"He's a drinker too, huh?"

Sam nodded. "He just. He never got himself together after my mom died. He couldn't... he wasn't there and even when he was, he wasn't. A lot of shit fell on Dean that shouldn't have and..." Sam paused. "I feel like I..." he broke off, painfully aware he was revealing too much.

"You what?" Jess pried gently.

"I..." Sam let out a slow breath through his mouth. He'd reined in his tears but his hands were trembling. Her warm palm felt like a life line. Like something to grab onto. He shrugged, out of words, pulled his hands away and wiped them on his jeans.

Sam felt his eyes well with tears. He blinked and tried to swallow them back down.

"Oh, hey." Jess' expression went soft with compassion. She reached out and touched his handsome face, a gentle brush of her hand against the high plane of his cheek bone. The gesture made the young Winchester catch his breath in pain. He scrunched his eyes shut, nose wrinkling in distress.

"Oh, Sam."

He felt her arms encircle him. She pulled him into her embrace. He stiffened and then went sideways with the movement and found himself pressed against her chest. Her heart under his ear, the soft roundness of her breasts against his cheek.

It triggered something unfamiliar in him. Some old inexpressible pain. He gritted his teeth against it, tense, unyielding.

Jess remained soft and tender, but strong, pressing his ear against her. She leaned down and ghosted a kiss over the top of his head. Her long blonde hair soft, tickling the slope of his nose.

Her warmth felt safe, reassuring, but the pain rose in him again and he couldn't swallow the lump in his throat. It hurt. Everything hurt so badly suddenly. All of it. Everything. Dean's anger, his family abandoning him, being misunderstood, having to go it alone. Knowing he couldn't go back. Yet not wanting to. Brady changing and lost innocence and ghosts and knowing things he shouldn't have ever had to know. He even felt bad he'd never had a mother.

Sam broke with a soft hiccuping sob of breath.

Jess pressed him tighter to her. "Shhh. It's okay, Sam."

"I'm sorry." He whispered.

"No. Don't be." He wondered if he should pull away but she seemed content to hold him and most of him wanted to stay right there.

The female affection felt foreign to him. Weakness like this had always been dealt with through the lens of men. By Dean's joking put downs, calling him a pansy, changing the subject. Or Dad's expectation that he suck it up and do what he had to do. At best he'd get a rough hug from Bobby and an affectionately grumbled "get it together, ya idjit."

 _This._ This distinctly _female_ reaction to nurture, to just hold him, to soothe him was completely beyond his experience. He didn't know what to do. It made him WANT to break. To indulge his weakness.

He sighed into her. Comforted for a minute, but the swell of her breasts beneath his cheek started to make his body react, even if his mind was still unsettled.

He broke away and cleared his throat.

Jess touched his jawline. "You okay?"

He nodded. "Yeah. Yeah. Sorry."

"Don't be sorry."

Sam scrubbed away the remnants of his tears with his hand, he measured his breathing, pushing for control. He huffed and smiled shyly, he gave a small shake of his head.

Jess studied him. "What? You don't have to be embarrassed in front of me, Sam."

"I'm just..." he shrugged, his dimples showing as he tightened his lips for a second. "This just feels weird, you know."

He read the hurt on her face.

He realized what it sounded like. "No! Jessica, not like that! I'm just..." he trailed off and slanted his gaze sideways. "I'm... well I guess I..." he paused trying to figure out what he was trying to vocalize. "I'm... wow." He broke off.

"Hey." She reached for his hand again and clasped it in hers. "What?"

His fingers tightened around her smaller palm for a moment before he let his grip go lax. "I grew up with men... like _all_ men. Just my dad and my brother, my uncle Bobby...just guys."

Jess smiled at him sweetly. "Lot of testosterone."

"Yeah..." he didn't understand how he could have such an education under his belt and yet still be stuck for words most of the time.

Jess stood up and brushed her fingers through his soft brown hair. "What are ya trying to tell me?"

Sam shrugged. "This is new for me. I guess."

"Being allowed to fall apart?"

"Yeah." Sam gave a half nod. "Yeah. I'm... Dad wasn't one for emotional displays."

"Well you know what?" Jess' hand stilled in his hair.

"What?"

"You're away from that now and I'm never gonna judge you for tears, Sam."

Sam felt himself fighting the urge to well up. He swallowed it and cleared his throat. "Yeah," he said past the lump.

"You're doing fine. You're all on you own and you're kicking ass in school. You're a good man. There's a lot to be proud of. You're a super amazing guy."

Jess ruffled his bangs and knelt down to take his face in her hands. "I'm proud of you."

He flushed shyly but when he met her eyes he could feel himself responding to her touch.

She leaned in to kiss away his half dry tear tracks. Her lips on his cheek made his breath catch.

"Jess," he asked, pulling away, his gaze intense and searching. "Is this more than friendship?"

She gave him a bright smile and stood up. "If you want it to be." She responded.

 **Phew. Long chapter. Thank you for the Reviews, Michele, WaitingforAslan, ShadowHuntingDD, Dom Darkwolf and ncsupnatfan. I'm sorry I didn't respond to all the reviews earlier. For some reason the notifications aren't getting to me and I'm having trouble with PMs. There are boogey men in the ff system this week. Thank you to everyone who reviews!**


	24. Chapter 24

She bent down to kiss away his half dry tear tracks. Her lips on his cheek made his breath catch.

"Jess," he asked, his gaze intense, searching. "Is this more than friendship?"

"If you'll let it be." She responded, then leaned back and gave him an appraising look. "But...I don't feel like you need more than that tonight." She kept her tone light. "I think you're tired. I think you should just curl up on the guest bed and take a nap."

"I can use the couch," he protested.

"Come on." She took his hand, stood up and he went pliantly, like a child, far too tired to argue or try for some weird chivalry code.

He glanced at the double bed for a minute and then toed off his worn blue sneakers and collapsed onto the warmth of the sheets.

Jessica joined him and he raised an eye brow at first and she leaned over to pull him against her.

Their lips met and he felt his pain began to channel into lust with a lightning quickness that almost took him aback, it sliced through his fatigue like a jolt of adrenaline. The more he felt of her the more he wanted her. He pressed his hip up into her and deepened the kiss. Jess responded, her lips parting under him as his tongue explored her mouth.

 _Oh my god this was heaven._ This right here. Wrapped in a woman's arms, her mouth on his, her hair in his face, her yielding softness pressed against him. His hands slid up under her shirt, caressing the smooth skin of her sides, edging his thumb up under the rim of her bra.

He felt her hands on his wrists and she pushed them back down.

Chastened, Sam let her, breaking the kiss and looking at her through his lust induced fog.

Her face was flushed, her wild mane of hair messed. She looked gorgeous. "I don't want to do this when you're hurting like this."

Sam cleared his throat and berated his dick, reining in his lust. "Yeah," he said, trying it get a hold of his breathing. "Yeah, of course. Sorry, it's been a while since I've had any action." He shifted, aware that his body was clearly ready to go, exhaustion or not.

Her blue eyes were earnest. "I just don't want this to start on this note. I really..." and here she paused, choosing her words with caution "... _care_ about you, Sam."

"I care about you too." And he thought it strange that she didn't want to take advantage of him being down. She could have him wrapped around her finger, clinging to her as an emotional lifeline. Or channeling his hurt into a pent up sack session. But she didn't want to. He almost wasn't sure what to do with that.

She pulled his head down into her again and he sighed. Slowly, he felt himself surrender into her nurturing warmth and realized that in all his long years, stretching way back to when he was a child, he'd never had a woman hold him. _Never..._ of all the strange things to have never experienced. No hug from mom. No kiss from an aunt. No softness that was female.

He'd held girls after sex; he'd had them cuddle with him post coitus, but being held with no expectation of him having to perform later was new.

This was just comfort, pure safe comfort. The kind he'd had from Dad when he was very, very young, but even then there had always been an expectation that he get a hold of his emotions. That he'd man up.

This was different. This side of woman that nurtured and held and gave compassion.

Sam opened his heart and let himself drown in it.

And for the first time in a very long time he thought that he really missed having a mother.

* * *

Sometime later, he awoke next to Jessica and looked up in awe at the soft planes of her face. Her beautiful full lips, the line of her throat. Her glorious golden hair spread wildly around them both. He had his legs tangled over one of hers. He shifted, his shoulder sore. He didn't want to move. Didn't want to break this covenant between them.

Jess blinked her eyes open, turned her head to look at him and smiled lazily. "Hey."

"Hi." He said back, letting his fingers trail through the soft curls of her mane.

She closed her eyes and leaned into him and he listened to her inhale his scent. "Do you feel any better?"

Sam cleared his throat. "Yeah. Yeah I do. Be kind of weird to _not_ feel better waking up with you like this." He blinked. "Fuck. I hope I didn't miss my class? Shit." He threw the blankets off and tried to sit up, a little woozy, his mop of hair in his eyes. "What time is it?"

Jessica's hand reached for him. "Hey take it easy."

"I..." Sam flipped open his cell phone. "Shit. I did miss it. Dammit."

He took a moment to try to rein in his fit of temper.

"Did you miss a quiz?"

"No. But attendance is important for my financial aid." He leaned his head into his hands.

"Okay. I'm on financial aid too, I get it." She sat up behind him and pressed her cheek to the side of his face. "Sam. Calm down."

He took a deep breath and nodded tightly.

"You're wound so tight and so stressed."

He nodded silently again.

She gave his shoulder a playful little shake. "We need to loosen you up."

"You sound like Dean," he said.

She leaned her head on his shoulder. "What is Dean like?"

Sam took a steadying breath and exhaled it, letting the missed responsibility go with it. Maybe he'd call in sick to his lawn care job. He was running himself ragged and this little breakdown was evidence of it. Here he had this fucking amazing woman with him in bed and instead of being over the moon with giddiness or lust drunk, he was crying from being over tired. It was ridiculous.

"Dean," Sam huffed a breath through his nose. "Dean is..." he paused. "Man, that's a loaded question."

"Good loaded or bad loaded?"

"Maybe a little of both." He hesitated, not wanting to cut his brother short. "But mostly good."

Jessica sat quietly, waiting for the silence to draw out more. When it didn't she prompted "...aaaaaand...?"

"We're opposites, really. Dean is...he doesn't take anything seriously." Sam paused, his mind sorting through images of Dean in rapid fire, eager to share a story to illustrate the point. "Especially his education. This one time he got expelled for getting caught with a girl in the teacher's supply closet."

Jess laughed. "And by caught you mean..."

Sam winced. "I mean having sex with her, yeah. They got busted because he grabbed one of the shelves for balance and it tipped and all the ninth grade ceramics flipped off and shattered. Kinda loud."

Jessica burst out laughing and Sam loved the sound, so rich and _alive._ "Oh my god...was it in the art room?"

"Yeah. Yeah it was."

She lost her composure again. "How old was he?"

Sam shrugged. "Um...I think I was fourteen so he was probably, like, seventeen? He dropped out not too long after that."

She shrugged her pretty shoulder. "What's he do for a living now?"

"Mechanic with my father." The lie rolled off his tongue without him even thinking about it. If he _had_ thought about it, it would have troubled him how easily the lies came. One after the other. Lie after lie. So simple to put together. Honed after so many years of lying to teachers and friends and lovers and the authorities. His whole life one big deception.

"Did you two get along?" She shifted her weight on the mattress and drew a leg underneath her. "I mean I know things were rough with your father, but you and Dean?"

Sam cleared his throat. "He's... it's complicated."

"That sounds ominous."

"Well sometimes we'd fight like cats and dogs." There was a long pause. "Most of the time we butted heads, but sometimes we got along great."

"Oh so the story of every sibling ever."

"Yeah," Sam replied. "I guess so."

Except it wasn't. Other siblings didn't rely on one another for survival. They weren't complicit in protecting one another from dangers seen and unseen. They didn't live their life in each other's pockets and then fall out and not speak to each other for years upon years. No one understood him like Dean. No one ever would.

Not even Jessica Moore.


	25. Chapter 25

Sam had never been as grateful for an absentee roommate as when he found himself tangled with Jessica Moore that Friday night. What started out as a soft exploratory kiss escalated as he felt Jess meet him with more enthusiasm than what he had been expecting. He stumbled a step backward with the surprise of her sudden weight against him and then once he'd recovered, he returned it with equal fervor, tangling his hands in her hair and squeezing his eyes shut, wanting to drown in her.

She was the perfect height for him. The only woman he'd dated where it wasn't necessary to bend in half to stoop down to reach her. She could rise up on her tip toes and he could press her to him and capture her mouth with his and squeeze her tight with adrenaline and lust.

She backed him against the bed until he smacked into the edge of the sunken dorm mattress with his knees and sat heavily.

She straddled him and Sam's eyes rolled back with the ecstasy of having her weight on his lap.

He wanted her more than he'd wanted anything in his life, and as his shirt came off and his bare skin slid against hers, he felt an emotion well up within him that was deeper than lust.

She was dragging him under with her like an anchor thrown at a drowning man.

He surfaced for a moment, able to hold onto reason long enough to dig through his wallet for a condom with shaking fingers. -Nerves joining in the fray of too much emotion.

Sam had had sex before. He'd even had sex with women he really cared about. But making love? In the making love department, Sam Winchester was still virgin.

He rearranged himself on the too small bed, bumped his head against the wall and blushed shyly, brown fringe of bangs falling over his eyes as Jess brushed them away with a joyous laugh.

Her body was the most beautiful thing he'd ever seen, all lean soft curves that were smooth under his hands.

He was faintly trembling again as she put her arms around him and pulled him tightly to her. He felt mildly embarrassed by his reaction but she seemed more charmed than bothered by it. It didn't dissuade her passion at all, even with the awkwardness of him trying to find how their bodies fit together that first time.

He met her need with no resistance; finally letting go of the floating board from the shipwreck he'd been clinging to- and down he sank with her.

Under the waves to _peace._

* * *

Brady watched Sam Winchester glance surreptitiously at Jessica Moore as she sat to the side of him, sharing a pizza. She laughed at her friend, Jerry, and covered her mouth to not lose the cheese.

Sam's reaction, as always, was understated. He was so controlled that it was hard to see how much he was falling for her.

Now Jessica... _her_ affection was so blatantly obvious when she looked at him that her face practically lit up.

Women were so easy to read when they loved a man. The way they looked at them, hung on every word, giggled and touched, pawed and fawned. It was almost pathetic really.

Men were usually a fraction more subtle with their signals. And Sam was even more subtle than most with his... yet still, Brady saw the affectionate way his hazel-blue eyes fixed on her face; his easy way of being with her. -The way he leaned toward her when she spoke or put his arm around her shoulders with a touch of pride.

He wondered what that blonde piece of ass was like in bed with those long legs wrapped around a man. Lucky bastard. She'd been chosen for Sam, but if she hadn't been...Brady would have pursued her relentlessly, maybe even taken her anyway if he grew tired of the chase.

He had known immediately that they would be a good set up, but even _he_ hadn't anticipated quite how compatible they seemed to be. Jess stole a fry off Sam's plate and popped it in her mouth as she talked to Zach, Rebecca, and her friend, Jerry.

Brady liked Jerry. He was an easy going young black man. A lot looser than most of the stuck up asshole intellectuals that populated Stanford. A black sheep, quite literally.

Sam sat listening in on the conversation, not saying much, as was his habit and politely enduring the occasional teasing. Lord knows he'd honed that skill from a childhood spent with his brother, Dean.

He seemed the least likely candidate ever to lead a Cadre of Demons.

It made the Demon Brady wonder what _was_ under all those layers of carefully applied self-control. Why did Sam keep such a tight lid on his actions? What dark currents was he keeping at bay? What dark thoughts swirled through his mind?

Or was all his carefully managed passion merely self-protection? Was Sam so frightened of being hurt that he carried himself with that rigid self-conscious tension as a defense against the harsh realities of the world with which he had grown up all too familiar with?

That tension was bleeding through his posture suddenly. Even with his Demonic hearing, Brady couldn't quite make out what had been exchanged at the table but it must have been something involving Sam's past to set him on edge the way it did.

Jessica moved with a loose easy freedom, smiling, lit up with charisma and almost a a counterpoint, Sam's posture was closed, smaller, rigid through his shoulders. He shrugged deferentially and made a remark that made the table laugh and the tension broke. The focus left him and Brady watched the protective shell slowly, ever so slowly, lift back off him.

Sam excused himself and stood up. Jessica's hand briefly touched his forearm and his dimple deepened at the gesture before he stood up and drew himself to his full height. His eyes scanned the room until they lit on Brady and he started toward him.

That body,-that tall, lean body- was going to be powerful when he filled out. And so was that nature...that stubborn tenacious nature when it was channeled correctly to a dark purpose... Oh, that was going going to be a thing of beauty.

Brady gave Sam his most charming smile and took a swig of his beer. "Coming up for air?"

Sam looked over his shoulder. "Yeah."

"Socializing takes it out of you, huh?"

"Yeah," Sam came to stand beside him, a few inches taller than Brady who was over six feet himself. "It really does."

Brady shook his head. "Putz."

"It didn't use to be your thing either," Sam told him, leaning his elbow on the bar and trying to catch the bartender's attention.

"I've grown." Brady smirked, eyes twinkling playfully. "It's like I discovered a different person inside myself. I realized you can draw energy from others, instead of letting them drain yours."

Sam gave him a sidelong glance. "Psychic vampire," he muttered under is breath.

"Oh please. We ALL take from each other's energy, that's how it goes. It's how sociable species interact." Brady gave Sam's calf a tap with his shoe. "Speaking of energy...I'm reading it between you and Jessica. You two an item?"

Sam colored a little and dropped his head. "Yeah." He gave the sidelong glance again through his brown bangs. "Yeah. I guess we kinda are."

Brady elbowed him, elated with the news. "Good job, Sam! That is a nice piece of ass."

He saw Sam's brow darken a little with disapproval. Oh, so he really, _really_ liked her. She was no longer in the "piece of ass" territory.

"She's a nice everything." Sam nodded at the bartender and took a mug of whatever was on tap.

"Is she now?" Brady wiggled his eyebrows.

Sam hunched his shoulders over and stretched a long leg backwards for a second as if lengthening his calf muscle to get out a cramp before he squared his stance again.

"Come on, Sam. She a wildcat in bed? You gotta spill the beans."

"No." Sam said. "Actually, I don't have to spill them."

"God, remind me that we need to find out medically how to pull that stick out of your ass sometime."

He saw Sam's dimple deepen in profile. "Good to know Stanford research dollars are going to a good cause."

Brady saw Jess heading over. He lifted his chin and gave the signal to Sam, who looked over his shoulder for a moment.

Brady could feel Sam soften. She came up and hugged him from behind, draping her long, toned body against his back and giving him an affectionate squeeze as she dropped her cheek on his shoulder.

Sam glowed with the attention. "Hey," he asked. Turning around within her embrace. "What's going on?

"Checking to see if you're okay."

"Fine," Sam said, leaning down to give her a quick kiss. "You can stay and talk to people. I've got Brady."

She gave Brady a quick wink. "You and Brady aren't people?"

"I'm sure not." Brady responded truthfully. Sometimes being a demon was easy because you didn't have to tell any lies at all.

 **Thank you Michele, Melissa, Dom Darkwolf, Shadow Hunting DD, ncsupnatfan, jmr24, and FGPDragon. I'm writing this for you. Okay, well, also for me. But I'm putting it online for awesome people like you who leave feedback.**


	26. Chapter 26

Sam straddled the chair of his old antique desk and watched Jess with unabashed affection as she flashed him a couple of bottles of nail polish. They clinked together in her hand like tiny shot glasses. "Which color?"

Sam tilted his head, considering with the seriousness he leant most everything in his life. "The peach."

She smiled at him, radiant, gorgeous as always. "My boyfriend has excellent taste."

Sam felt a little touch of pride as she said the word. _Boyfriend._ He was hers _._ She was his. He still couldn't wrap his head around it.

She pulled her foot toward her chest, her dark blue sleep shorts rode up tantalizingly as she bent her knee. She opened the bottle and the unfamiliar tang of nail polish wafted strongly over to his nose. He still wasn't used to it. He wasn't used to any of the scents associated with femininity. -Her shampoo, her baby powder deodorant. The way the soap she borrowed from him interacted with her skin differently than his. Nail polish and hair spray and even the scent of her berry lip gloss. All exotic and new and exquisite, just as she was.

His once spartan dresser was littered with her colorful rubberized hair ties and soft bristled brush. Her curling iron. All little bits of Jess she left with him when she was gone, although she rarely slept at her dorm room anymore. Instead they ended up tangled together on Sam's too small mattress, Jess sleeping practically on top of him, his face buried in that wavy golden hair.

She glanced up at him as she wiped the excess paint off on the lip of the glass bottle and started to paint her toe. "Crap! I can never do this right."

Sam angled his head again. "It looks hard to do to yourself."

"It is unless you're a contortionist." She said, wiping off her mistake with her finger. Sam stood up and sat down beside her on the bed. He held out his hand, palm up. "Hand it over."

She gave him a smile and put her foot on his lap, handed him the bottle. "Have you ever done this before?"

"Yes. I painted Dean's toes all the time." He gave her his dimpled smile and dropped his eyes to the task at hand. "No. But I'm a quick learner."

She nudged his thigh with her other foot. "Oh yes you are."

He caught the double entendre behind the words and repressed another grin, feeling himself flush a little.

Sam wiped the excess paint off the brush as he'd seen her do and laid a stripe of color carefully on her big toe. Then repeated next to it, methodically covering the area. It took a bit of concentration to keep his hand steady but once he got into the rhythm of working, he didn't mind it at all.

"So what's with the painted nails?" He asked, furrowing his brow as he worked.

She shrugged. "Just kind of a fun change and I have a physics exam I should be studying for, so this is a great excuse to put it off."

He snorted and started on the next toe. "You know, Jessica..." Sam bit his lip and looked up at her.

"What?" She asked.

"I..." he swallowed. "I've never been this happy before." He felt himself coloring. The words seemed stupid and trite leaving his mouth but her look upon hearing it was anything but judgmental. She looked pleased.

He winced. "That sounds so dumb. I'm sorry."

"What about saying I make you happy sounds dumb? For someone so smart you are..."

"Dumb?" He supplied.

She giggled. "I was gonna say clueless. But dumb works too."

He snorted and finished with her toe. Moved to the next one. "I was thinking after the semester ends...do you wanna get an apartment together?"

"And get off freaking campus? And away from the most annoying roomie in the world. Yes!"

Sam smiled broadly. He finished her first foot and started on the second, adjusting his grip on the nail polish brush. "They make these things too tiny."

"I don't think your size hands belong to their target demographic."

He smirked. "Probably not."

"You're pretty good at this."

"I'm just methodical." He replied. "Dad grilled doing things correctly into us."

"What, he a perfectionist or something?" She asked, laying back against the mattress and flopping her arms out. A tiny bit of her stomach peeked out from under her shirt. She breathed deeply. Sam wanted to kiss it but he kept his attention on her feet.

"Military."

"Oh." She replied, tucking her chin to look at him from her sprawl on the bed. "I still wish you'd tell me a little more about him"

Sam's jaw tightened. "Not much to tell."

"You..." she picked up his pillow and tossed it at his head. It thunked off his temple and he blinked and dove to save the nail polish bottle from tipping. "Jessica!"

She giggled. "Oops, sorry."

"You're almost as bad as Dean sometimes."

"Maybe Dean is fun."

"I'm fun." Sam replied, a little petulantly. He grabbed her ankle. "Stop wiggling, I want to finish this."

She wiggled her toes on purpose and Sam snorted a reluctant laugh. "Stop."

"Sam, you know everything about me. Like where I went to school. Who my friends were. My mom and dad and cousins. I know that your dad made you guys move a lot, you're really mad at him right now, and you and your brother fight like cats and dogs."

"You like to reminisce because you had a normal life...I didn't.." he paused, searching for a word. He couldn't find an adequate one so he copped out with a lame descriptor, _"like_ a lot of my childhood and talking about it makes me unhappy."

"Maybe you need to let it out." She said, arms still outstretched as she lay there.

"I enjoy things now. So I'm just trying to live in the now...you know," he glanced up at her with affection... "with you."

He finished her toes and replaced the screw on cap on the nail polish.

"I just want to know where my boyfriend comes from." She coaxed, still stretched out alluringly. Sam slid his hand up her smooth naked leg. Watching her expression.

She grinned at him. "Sam..."

"Huh," he asked, moving to stretch his long lanky body over hers. He kissed her softly.

She moved her head to come up for air. "Stop trying to distract me."

Sam touched his nose to her with a smile. "Why?"

"Because..."

He felt his body responding to her. He never got tired of her. "I love you." She told him unabashedly.

"I love you too." He replied. It was one of the first times he'd heard the words from someone...ever. His heart swelled with emotion.

"I've never been this happy before, Jess."

As his lips met hers it occurred to Sam that he could have simplified the sentence and it would have remained just as accurate.

'I've never been happy before.'

He knew what it felt like now. And deep down he was afraid to lose it.

* * *

Palo Alto weather had a tendency to skip spring and move directly into summer. So it was truly summer-like to Sam when easter break came sliding into view and Sam wondered what he was going to do without Jessica Moore for two weeks.

"I think you should come meet my family and spend the holiday with us." She dropped the bomb three days before vacation.

Sam stiffened in his seat. "I've got work," he said automatically.

"The library is closed, goofy."

"The lawn care."

Jess narrowed her gaze in one of the first looks of disapproval she'd ever given him. He felt small under it. He felt it as a sharp rebuke, even though there had really been none.

"I'm movin' in with you. I think it's time my parents met you, Sam."

He ducked his head, feeling a tightness in his chest that he recognized as anxiety. Sam had learned to supress that beginning-of-fear reflex long ago, to stamp it out immediately. It muddled your thoughts and in their old line of work that meant the difference between life and death.

He wondered about Dean and if he did the same thing when faced with something that terrified him.

"I'm not so good at social interactions. You may have noticed."

"You," Jess straddled his lap. "Will..." she kissed his nose. "Be." She kissed his forehead. "Perfect."

He drew in a deep breath and pushed down the fear reflex. "How important is this to you?"

Her blue eyes met his. "Very." She told him.

Then he had no choice. He'd have to face the monster like he always had.

"If you want me to then I will." He told her softly. "I love you."

"I love you and I will be there with you every second."

Somehow that made him feel better, just like it did when he had to do a salt and burn and he knew Dean had his back.

 **Thank you for my reviews. They feed me.**


	27. Chapter 27

Brady leaned forward over the table with his charming, slightly mischevious white smile. "So how was it playing meet the parents?"

Sam took a pull of his beer. "It was..." he dropped his gaze under his fringe of bangs and gave a deferential shrug. "Awkward."

Brady grinned at him. "Oh so you made a great impression, huh?"

"I made somethin." Sam said.

Jessica nudged him and Sam colored. "Knock it off. They liked you fine."

Sam's eyes slid sideways and downward in a way that clearly said he didn't agree. The youngest Winchester was a master at letting his feelings be known through his body language alone.

"Of course Sam is terminally shy so he wasn't so good at answering, like, _anything_ about himself beyond his major and that his dad traveled a lot."

"That's all he ever says," Brady teased. "You should have just made up a back story for him. Like we do."

Sam's shoulders went tight. Jessica noticed and put her hand between his shoulder blades to rub them. "My mom thought he was adorable. I mean, who wouldn't?" She smiled fondly.

Sam traced his fingernail into the groove of the table. He stood up. "I gotta use the bathroom."

Jessica and Brady watched him go.

"So," Brady turned to her., his coiffed blonde bangs falling into one eye. "What is the real scoop?"

"Sam was just really quiet. He's so shy that he just doesn't let people get to know him." She glanced toward his retreating tall figure. "He seemed like he just didn't know how to be with a family."

Brady shrugged. "Well, duh. He doesn't."

She bit her shiny glossed lip. "I know. Poor Sam. I feel kinda like he was sad half the time."

"He's always a bit of a party pooper on holidays, Jess." Brady rolled his eyes.

She brushed her mane of wavy hair back and took a pull of her bottle. Brady couldn't help but imagine those lips around his dick. Shame she was Sam's.

"I always wonder how bad his home life was. He just..." She paused, searching for words. "He's so _sad_ when he talks about it."

Sam was heading back to them and they broke off the conversation almost guiltily.

He sat back down at the table and leaned over to give her a peck on her cheek. Jessica accepted the affection with an indulgent smile.

Brady shook his head. "She's kinda perfect, Sam. You're gonna have to marry her."

Sam flushed a little and looked up at Brady. "It's a little early for that but you never know. I just might someday."

* * *

The following months were the most peaceful Sam Winchester had ever known in his life.

He and Jessica had to be careful with finances, yet there was something romantic about slowly accumulating the things they needed for the apartment and spending the first few months together on a mattress thrown on the wooden floor with their belongings in boxes, eating Phil's Pizza in front of a tiny TV Zach had given them.

They had Jessica's tall wooden dresser. A queen-sized mattress Sam bought, the television, and Sam's antique wooden desk. Later they added some odds and ends Brady gave them. Jessica's parents lent them assorted things from their house.

Sam quit the lawn care job and kept the hours at the library and things turned into a peaceful rhythm. School and study, work, and Jessica to come home to every night. He was content...except on the occasion when Dean crept into his thoughts and he felt a small squeeze in his chest for that little piece that was missing.

Eventually though, his recollections of Dean grew a little less often, a little less urgent, and it seemed that his childhood and adolescence was something from another life, some strange fever dream separate from his reality.

He should have known better. Peace wasn't for Winchesters.

* * *

It was October. There wasn't much chill in the air in Palo Alto. No leaves turning, no dark and frosted nights. Just more pleasant weather.

"Sam, what are we going to be for Halloween?" Jess asked brightly, her hand laced in his as they passed a Halloween shop in the strip mall.

Sam turned his head to look at the display window stocked with various latex masks. A parade of the grotesque.

He shrugged. "I don't dress up."

She tugged him inside the shop and Sam followed like a dog on a leash...or an obedient husband. One in the same sometimes, Dean would have said.

"Oh, come on." She said brightly, letting go of him and weaving through the store. Sam paused, casting an eye around the macabre display. Some of it was comical, he supposed.

Bits of knowledge gleaned from his past came flooding through to his current life. He knew from experience flesh wounds didn't gape in quite that way. They puckered in a different pattern. The meat slick and shiny underneath. Sometimes there was fascia visible in the bits of bloody muscle fibers. An axe embedded in a skull didn't look like that either. It was more horrible in real life, though somehow less dramatic.

Based on the lore and Dad's accounts- werewolves definitely didn't look like that.

He circled around behind Jess and knocked into a mask that brushed his shoulder.

He started and stepped away. "God dammit!"

An evil clown's face leered up at him, sharp yellowed teeth and yellow eyes. Something about the yellow eyes made him recoil instinctively. Brought up some recollection he didn't want to recall. Couldn't quite grasp, although it wanted to bleed through a gauzy shield in his memory.

She turned to look at him, eyebrow raised in surprise. "Not a fan of clowns?"

Sam stepped away, blinking. "I freaking hate clowns."

"Does this extend to mimes?" she asked, dead pan.

"Uh, pretty much anything in the clown realm." Sam replied. He took a breath to calm his racing heart and suddenly didn't feel very well. A sense of doom flooded him. Memories of days spent in lonely, isolated boredom at _Plucky Pennywhistle's_ , abandoned by Dean with a only a handful of quarters to keep him company. Waiting. Waiting. _Waiting_ for someone to come get him.

Or at the library, buried in books. _Waiting. Waiting_.

In the car. _Waiting. Waiting._ Wondering if his brother and father would come back alive. Wondering what he would do if they didn't.

The air left his lungs.

Jessica had turned away and didn't seem to notice. "You read Stephen King's IT too young?"

Sam shook his head to clear it, his former reality catching up to him. He swallowed hard, unsure why the sensations were overwhelming him like this. He steadied his voice. "Something like that."

Jess picked up a Sailor Moon outfit and held it up to herself, cocking her head coyly.

"What do you think?"

Sam forced a smile. "I...I think you'd make a... hot anime character."

She smiled brightly, but the smile faltered on her full lips as she studied his face. "Hey, what is it?" She tilted her head and a cascade of blonde mane fell over her shoulder.

"I'm just not fond of the holiday."

"Everyone loves Halloween, Sam."

"I'm..." he steadied himself. He'd been around this shit his whole life. Facing a few rubber masks should be nothing to him. Not even a blip on the radar. "I don't."

"Why?"

"I just..." he took a breath again and squared his shoulders. "Look, you can love it. I don't have to."

Jessica seemed a little baffled by his personality shift. "I want to share it with you. Come on. Let's do a couple's thing."

Sam's tone was sharper than he'd meant it to be. _"Jessica, no."_

She seemed shocked. As if her mild-mannered puppy had growled at her. "You don't have to be a jerk about it. Are you still upset by the clown?"

"Look I gotta...I'm gonna wait outside." He turned on his heel and left the store, back into the Palo Alto sunshine.

Jess came out a few minutes later. She extended a hand to take his arm. "Hey. Talk to me."

"I'm sorry I snapped at you." He said, his face soft with apology

"Just tell me what's wrong?" She asked, stepping into his space a bit.

"Nothing."

"Oh come on, Sam, don't do that." She looked a little defeated, her hand still on his arm before she let it go.

Sam glanced around at the people passing by, automatically feeling shy. He shrank into himself a little. "I don't... can we talk about it later?"

"You never want to talk about anything that's happened to you and I try not to push. But you need to let me in sometimes, you know."

"I let you in more than I've ever let anyone in." He protested.

"That makes me sad for you." She didn't say it with any malice or irony.

Somehow the remark hurt him. He blinked back his emotion, tried to cover it.

"Yeah." He tightened his jaw.

She looked frustrated and he could see she was debating whether to push him or not.

"It's a holiday that celebrates everything wrong with the world, Jess. All the cruelty and depravity. Man's darkest impulses. Our nightmares."

"It's a dress up day!" She countered. "It's a time to thumb our collective noses at death."

Sam shrugged. "I just don't do it...I mean you can. I'm not gonna stop you."

"Fine. I'll dress up."

Sam nodded. "Good. You should."

"This feels like it's more a personal reaction rather than a philosophical one."

 _Dammit. She knew him too well._

She looked up into his face, studying him. "You gonna tell me about it so I can understand?"

Sam's shoulders tightened again. He hadn't quite adapted to being with a person who wanted to talk feelings out- drag them out into the open, examine them.

Sheer vulnerability.

Openness and trust.

It was so _opposite_ what he'd been conditioned to do. What he did on instinct.

Ironically, of the Winchesters, Sam himself was the one most apt to want to talk things out...but he realized now that he had nothing on women.

They were amazing to him-all that openness right there on the surface. They could verbalize feelings before he even had time to process WHAT he was feeling. It was like alchemy.

It was also maddening when he wanted to escape the scrutiny.

"It's complicated."

"Of course it is. Everything is complicated with my Sam." She took his hand. "Come on, Mr Privacy." She led him circling around the side of the building, where there was less people and sat on empty iron bench with a plaque commemorating a long deceased family member no one knew or cared about. She pulled him down with her.

He sat down and sighed, dropping his elbows onto his knees and curling his height into himself a little.

"Tell me what's wrong." She said again. "I'm tired of being locked out."

Her authoritative tone surprised him. That wasn't Jessica's manner.

"I..." he pulled himself up to look at her. "To you the gore is fun and silly but I've _seen_ it. I've lived with the effects my whole life. My dad...he woke at night terrified from what he saw in Nam. I've heard the stories. Seen those old black and white documentaries. My mom..." he swallowed. "She _burned_ to death, Jess. In my nursery. I don't remember it, but I saw what that did to my Dad. To Dean, even. I spent most Halloweens alone in crappy motel scared of drunks and watching people parade around in masks." He paused in his litany, his brows knitting together. "Can you understand what I'm saying?"

She'd gone soft-eyed. "God, Sam. I'm so sorry your life has been unkind."

The sympathy made him feel sorry for himself and he shoved the emotion down.

"I've got you now. So maybe it's making up to me," he told her. He took her beautiful hands in his and kissed her gently.

He should have known better. Life didn't make anything up to Winchesters.

Life was unkind.

Always.

And ever.

T **hank you for the reviews! I tried to answer them all this time. Please forgive me if I missed you. I promise that the shit is going to hit the fan soon. Stay tuned!**


	28. Chapter 28

Brady arrived at Jerry's Halloween Party with his usual swagger, although he was slightly late, sidetracked by hookers and drugs. He'd chosen to dress as what he was. Red cape, devil horns, pitch fork. He contemplated not bothering to hide his black eyes. He figured he could say they were contacts. But for the party, he left them blue.

Jerry ushered him in, clapped him on the shoulder and announced _"Devil in da House!"_

"Demon," Brady corrected with a wink.

Jerry handed him a shot. "You've got the horns and pitchfork and shit. You're the devil, quit playin."

Jerry was sporting a gerry curl wig, white socks and single glove. Michael Jackson circa 1980s.

Brady downed the shot and looked around for Sam. "We prefer Demon." He said lightly.

Jerry laughed and raised an eyebrow. "Are demons a misrepresented minority?"

"Actually, yes. Think of how much stereotyping there is with my kind. Everyone assumes we have bad motives. Don't even give us a chance."

"I hear that." Jerry said without irony.

"So the PC Term is demon." Brady flashed a perfect white grin. "Devil is so...18th century Salem."

As he spoke, his attention honed in on Sam sitting quietly at a high top table. Jessica was standing next to him, looking like a 1940s pin up, her sky high legs in fishnets, those lush lips in Ruby red matte lipstick.

She wore the obligatory slut Halloween costume for sexy college girls. A version of a naughty cop, fake cuffs at her side- _oh what he would do to her with those_ -her hair partly pulled up underneath the brim of a blue hat. She looked hot.

Sam was in his usual tan canvas jacket, his eyes reading that he wanted to go home.

Brady, gave his plastic pitchfork a twirl and briefly wondered why they didn't really use them in Hell. They would be an exquisite tool of torture if wielded with finesse. Even without finesse they'd be fairly horrible.

He extracted himself from Jerry and slid over to the table, finding more than a little satisfied amusement that Halloween offered him the opportunity to come out of the closet as it were. Show these morons who he was and have them brush it off with a laugh.

He almost wanted to tell Jerry that Michael Jackson's 20 year deal was just about to come due.

Instead, he crashed the table where Sam sat radiating all the enthusiasm of a man dragged somewhere to help pick out purses.

"Having fun, Sam?"

Sam rolled his eyes up to meet Brady's. "Hey."

Jess took a sip of her drink. She was clearly a little looser than usual. Brady's eyes dove to her cleavage.

"I thought Jerry's party would be too low key for you, Tyson." Sam said.

"Nah! I'll liven up anything I'm at." He gave Jessica a flirty glance. "Man, so will she. Gonna get arrested later, Sam?"

Sam gave his lopsided grin. "I kinda hope I do."

Brady saw the little flirt charged look that passed between them before Jessica looked up. "Sam is gonna be a baaaad boy later," she said with a wink. "Well now that Brady is here to keep you company, Sam, I'm gonna mingle."

Sam nodded. "Okay."

"So you look as socially adept as always." Brady replied, sliding onto a stool.

He itched his nose against the back of his hand. The lines of coke he'd done earlier had the insides of his nose tingling.

"You know I don't like parties much."

Sam had his eye on a zombie costume for a minute and turned his gaze away. Brady could read the tension. So young Sam Winchester remembered a little more of his previous life than he wanted to. Sam was made uneasy by the monsters and ghosts and ghouls around him. Even though they were all human. Which in Brady's experience were far worse than any supernatural entity.

Although, he thought wryly, supernatural was the wrong term for them. They were natural. All of them. They just moved and acted by rules that humans didn't grasp.

"Hey you look like you're having some kind of PTSD flashback, Sammy."

That jolted Sam right back to full attention before the words were finished coming out of his mouth.

"You know I hate being called Sammy. It's Sam."

"Geez. Okay. But Sammy fits you bet-"

"No." He replied flatly.

 _"Me-ow!"_ Brady grinned against the rim of his glass. "Pissy."

"I'm sorry." Sam huffed. "I just...these things make me on edge."

"I know. People. Fun. It's just...too much."

Sam gave him a flash of dimples. "Yeah touche."

"Someday you will earn _The Introvert of the Year Award._ But today is not that day." Brady slapped him on the back. He looked at Jessica's shapely ass. "Man, I don't know what that girl sees in you."

Sam cocked an eyebrow. "Actually, me either."

Sam froze like a rabbit in headlights. "Shit." He said.

"What?" Brady looked up.

"Isn't that one of the guys we got into the fight with?" Sam said in a hushed tone.

"Gotta be more specific than that, Sam."

"The one we kept from raping that girl. Tom...something?"

Brady looked up. And he'd be damned. It _was_ Tom. And along with him was that little brunette bitch. Which wasn't a surprise, really. They always went back. _A_ _lways._

Sensing he was being observed, he looked up and his eyes met Brady's. Tom was still undeniably a demon. Brady could see the meat suit, but he could also see the twisted demonic visage underneath. Somehow it surprised him that Sam had noticed his presence before himself. Guess the Winchester still did have some of the instincts Azazel was so afraid he'd lost.

"Yeah, okay." Sam stood up. "I'm not sticking around for this."

"Relax." Brady swept his red cape over his shoulder with aplomb and approached.

The girl, Shelley, looked at him with open hostility but took a step back. "Leave him alone."

Brady snorted at her pretend boldness. Like he didn't have the power to snap her in half with a wave of his wrist and then violate the cooling body if the urge struck him.

Tom pushed her back with his arm. "You don't need to defend me, Shelley. Go get a drink. I'm having a word here."

He stepped forward, tilted his head, dropped his voice. "Fancy meeting you here."

Brady nodded. "Why are you here?"

"My father gave me an assignment to test Sam's metal." He shrugged. "I got bored. Decided to hang around and observe."

Brady called his bluff. "Checking up on me?"

"Maybe." Tom narrowed his gaze.

Brady couldn't hide a sneer. "I don't need to be babysat."

"Azazel has final say on that." Tom replied, daring him to step out of line with his tone.

Brady backed down. Azazel was a scary fucker. He knew better.

"Well I'm doing my job."

"I may only stick around a bit longer. Bound to get bored of this vacation anyway. The prospect of a new meat suit holds some appeal. I've ridden this one pretty hard." Tom arched an eyebrow. Do your job and we'll be fine. Keep the Winchester from losing his edge."

He turned and was swallowed by the crowd.

* * *

Jessica followed behind Sam, her heels clopping a little drunkenly on the pavement as he walked ahead of her, his hand interlaced with her own, dragging her behind him like an errant child.

"Jeez, Sam!" She said, her ankle turning sideways a little with an ominous scuffing sound of her stiletto. She tugged her hand out of his grasp. In heels she was actually nearly his height. "Slow down, will ya!"

Sam lurched backward with her dead weight.

"What is your problem?" She asked, bending to adjust her miniskirt. "You just drag me out of there and start hauling me down the street like the devil is after us."

Sam glanced over her head to survey the door to Jerry's place. "Look. There's someone I don't want to talk to in there."

She turned her lovely head. "Who?"

Sam took her arm. "I'll tell you later."

She stuck out her glossed lip in a pout. "Tell me now."

"Jess..." Sam realized his logical process might not be well received by her in her current inebriated state. "Baby, I'll tell you later, okay?"

"An ex?"

"No." Sam replied. _Half truth. Always go with half truth._ "Brady and I got into a fist fight with him last year."

She snorted. "You? A fist fight? Come on, Sam."

Oh, if only she knew how many countless fights he'd been involved in as the new geeky kid in every school, as the pretty boy teen in every beat up motel he and Dean stayed at. Although he'd never had that as bad as his brother. _  
_

"Yeah...I've had my share of fist fights in my life, you know. But I don't want another one. So can we just leave?"

He saw her considering. "I was having fun."

"Well me busting someone's lip isn't going to be fun."

"What was the fight over?"

Sam grabbed her arm and started to haul her down the manicured sidewalk. A sidewalk that hadn't seen the hardship of the cracked ones he'd traversed his whole childhood.

Too late. Confrontation was imminent.

"Take your blonde bitch and leave! Never mind ruining my life!" Jess whirled at the remark, took in the brunette that had come down the steps and followed them a few paces. She seemed plastered. The night wasn't even that old.

"What the hell?" Jess asked, straightening up.

"Jess ignore her. She's drunk." Sam tightened his grip on his girlfriend's arm.

"Who is she?" Jess tugged out of his grip again.

Sam turned around and almost walked right into Tom. His eyes went wide and he sidestepped before his brain even had time to process the question of: _how the hell did he get over here so quickly?_

They met eyes and stood for a moment, sizing each other up like two stray dogs.

Tom grabbed for Sam's collar as Sam tried to pull back out of his reach. He didn't summon quite enough speed to stop it. Tom's fingers closed around his jacket and he gave Sam a hard shove. Sam staggered back several feet with the force but kept his balance. He shifted his weight to the balls of his feet, his hands palms out in front of his face, feigning trying to placate his opponent, but in actuality, ready to deflect any punches thrown. "Hey...think about what you're doing."

He could feel Jessica's confusion behind him. "Jess," Sam added levelly. "Stay out of the way."

Sam's eyes went back to his Tom's dark gaze. "Why don't we just leave it here?"

He was answered with a jab that he ducked.

"Look I don't want a fight..."

The second jab he deflected but it was followed by an elbow to the side of the jaw that sent Sam sideways as a stinging redness bloomed along his cheek. He felt his adrenaline spike at the pain and now he _was_ ready to fight.

He came in with a high swing, which Tom ducked nimbly. Sam's opponent tried to turn it into a grapple but Sam knew what he was doing and landed a kick in the back of Tom's knee to escape it.

Tom buckled a little and Sam slammed his hand down onto the other man's shoulder, hoping that would bring him down. It did but Tom grabbed Sam's arm and took the younger man with him, using Sam's body as a fulcrum to roll back up to his feet. Sam controlled his fall and rolled back up himself.

Whoever this asshole was, he had fight training.

Tom was on his feet and within seconds he had done a twisting, snaking move to spin to the other side of Sam. He reached out and grabbed Jess by the back of her long blonde hair. Her navy blue police hat went tumbling to the ground.

Jess yelled and staggered with the unexpected move and large frightened blue eyes. Sam felt a protective rage like nothing he'd ever experienced narrow his senses and almost black out his vision for a moment and every instinct was suddenly set to _kill._

"Leave her out of this." He growled, and his voice was something he didn't even recognize. Commanding and several octaves lower.

Tom grinned.

"I will kill you." Sam said lowly.

Tom smiled. "Oh really?"

Jessica kicked him with her heel and he hissed and tightened his hold, giving her a little shake. "Knock it off, bitch!"

Sam used his reach to land a fist into the side of the other man's rib, causing a reflexive inhale. It forced him to momentarily loosen his grip on Jess and Sam threw him sideways away from her with all of his strength.

Tom looked mildly surprised as Sam puffed himself out to his full size, shoulders squared, suddenly a weapon and almost intimidating in his stature. He drove forward and caught Tom in the face with a right hook and a spray of blood from a loosened tooth landed on Sam's cheek and lip. He blinked at the warm droplets, wiped them away with a his sleeve, smearing them in a macabre red abstract across his face.

Tom grinned like he didn't mind that Sam had probably just broken part of his jaw. There was a strange almost madness in his eyes that may have frightened him on some level if Sam hadn't been too enraged to register it. In fact, the adrenaline seemed to spike suddenly and he didn't want to stop himself.

But suddenly people were around them shouting. "Hey, hey you two! Break it up!"

There were arms around Sam from behind that he tried to shove off. "SAM!" It was Zach's voice. "Knock it off, man!"

It pierced through the veil of adrenaline and anger. A weird heady sensation he'd seldom had really. Sam shook his head to clear it and saw that Brady was pulling Tom back.

Sam shrugged Zach off. "Got it. I'm okay man."

He leveled his gaze at Tom. "Do not touch my girlfriend again." He turned to Jess. "Are you okay?" he asked, still coming down off his hulk rage.

Jessica's lower lip was trembling a little. She nodded, her mascara smeared a little under her eyes. Her blonde hair was tangled. She looked like a rock star coming off a bender.

Sam felt the anger drain off him, although some part of him still felt weirdly elated at the confrontation.

Zach patted his back. "You okay, man?"

"I'm good." Sam said, rolling his shoulders to loosen them.

"Shit, you got that guy good."

"Look. Tell Jerry Jess and I went home. I'm sorry about the fight."

Zach nodded, cocking a black eyebrow. "Get out of here before some neighbor calls the cops. And clean yourself up."

"Sure, thanks." Sam bent down to grab the fallen police hat and tucked Jessica under his arm. He cast around to see Tom and Brady talking quietly. Shelley was nearby, her cat-eared head band askew. Sam caught her eye. She looked sad. Or maybe Sam was just sad for her.

* * *

Sam looked at himself in the mirror of the bathroom as he waited for the perpetually icy water to warm up. He looked like he'd made himself up for Halloween. Blood spatter was all over his cheek.

He leaned against the edge of the sink, steadying himself. An image of Dean's gore spattered face looking up at him from the grave stone he'd been knocked into flashed across his mind. He closed his eyes and inhaled slowly. It was a memory he didn't want to be saddled with. It had been one of the only times that he'd been scared of his brother. He'd seen something there. A sort of blood lust that startled Sam. He thought of his own reaction that night. Of that all consuming rage that had swept over him and wondered if he, Sam, were capable of it too.

Sam soaped his face up and scrubbed off the blood. He rinsed his skin over and over, feeling the water rush over his lips and closed eye lids. Cleansing him. He felt dirty. Impure.

He looked up and Jessica was in the door way, visible in the mirror. He shut the water off and she handed him a towel. She'd taken off her make up and slipped into cotton drawstring pants and a crop top.

She still looked shaken. "I hope that blood didn't get into your eyes or mouth."

"Pretty sure it got my mouth."

She winced. "Sam, there's like like a thousand contagious pathogens that way."

He sighed. "I know. I'm not gonna think about it. I'll be fine."

He ran the soft cotton over his face, dried under his chin. His t-shirt was soaked. He peeled it off.

"You wanna tell me what that was about?"

God. He didn't feel like he had the mental resources to deal with this right now. He thought of Dad bloody and shaken after a hunt and how he'd never given him any quarter.

"I don't know what happened. He jumped me. You saw."

"Who was he?"

"Just some guy...He was getting very...aggressive with a girl before I met you and Brady and I intervened. It turned out to be his girlfriend there. She wasn't happy to be rescued and he wasn't happy either, apparently. I think she's a mutual friend of Zach and Rebecca's. Probably why she was at the party." He snorted. "I told you I don't like Halloween."

Jessica hugged him and Sam wrapped his arms around her. "Thank you for rescuing me. I never... I didn't know you could fight like that."

"Yeah, well. Dad _is_ an Ex-Marine."

He held her for a long time. They ended the night snuggled on the couch eating chocolates that were supposedly reserved for the Trick-or-Treaters and watching cheesy horror flicks. Except for the beginning of the night, it was the best Halloween Sam remembered.

 **Thanks guys! Drop me a review, pretty pretty please!**


	29. Chapter 29

Sometimes Sam thought of Dean. He wondered if he was safe. He wondered where he was. He wondered if their paths would ever cross again.

Sometimes he'd be filing away an old leather bound book at his library job and it would have a title like _Psychic Phenomenon of New England_ or _Common Urban Myths_ and it was like the Universe occasionally reminded him of the Life he'd tried to leave behind. The rope he'd tried to cut. Some days he thought he had severed it completely but then an old book was there to remind him of what he knew. And it was then that Sam would feel the tug of the invisible chain he had never freed himself from.

Suddenly he'd think of hours of his childhood spent researching lore. And all those old feelings of loneliness and resentment settled somewhere in his chest in a vague feeling of anxiety that he could never quite sort enough to put a name to.

Even though he'd adapted well to his life amongst normal people, it still fascinated him somehow that their lives were so... _simple_. There was a clarity in the outside world that he'd never had when he'd been swept into the surreal world of ghosts and monsters.

He tried his best to forget those parts of his life, compartmentalize them into separate chapters and lock them into his subconscious. Occasionally Jess asked questions that made him open one of the boxes and look at it before he could shove a lid back on it again. He wished he could share the truth with her at times. But he never did.

Secrecy had been drilled into him since he'd been born. Let no one in. And honestly, he looked into her gorgeous blue eyes and as much as he wanted to tell her about his private wounds, he didn't want to as well. Even if she somehow believed him and didn't think he was crazy, such knowledge would fundamentally change who she was. He didn't want to put that burden on her. And he knew deep down that he never would.

Even though Sam Winchester had borne so much more than the civilians he was surrounded by, he had not lost his compassion. It was the lode star of his life. It colored his view point and it guided his decisions.

Even if their strife seemed trivial in comparison to that of the Winchester men, he knew by instinct that pain was pain. And hurt was hurt, no matter the source.

Jessica had been betrayed in love before. She'd had friends shift their alliances with the wind and leave her behind when it was convenient for them. She'd lost her grandparents at the age of 10 and still missed them. He never allowed himself to think "well at least you _had_ friends!" "At least you _had_ grandparents."

Instead, he felt all of her losses as sharply as if they had happened to him. Such was Sam's heart. If Mary Winchester had ever lived to see her son grow into a man, she would not have been disappointed.

* * *

Sam furrowed his brow when he found Jessica curled on the couch with a heating pad on her stomach. "Hey," he said softly, looking at the tight expression on her face. Her hair was pulled into an unkempt pony tail. "What's wrong? Cramps?"

She nodded miserably.

"You need me to get you some aspirin?"

She shook her head.

"How about I draw you a warm bath?"

Jessica looked at him with those beautiful blue eyes and he dropped down to one knee and brushed a tendril of gold away from her cheek.

"It's bad today?"

She nodded looking weepy. His heart gave a flop. "I'm sorry."

Menstrual cycles were a unique hell he'd never thought about until he'd started living with Jessica. She bore them in silence and was fine most of the time, but sometimes she'd have a bad month and pain got the better of her.

He was ill equipped to sit around and not fix the problem, so after ascertaining what was wrong, he dutifully drew a steaming bath and pulled the Tylenol from the medicine cabinet with a glass of water.

He brought it out to and handed it to her. "Come on. Let's get ahead of the pain, okay?" His voice was gentle as if talking to a frightened horse.

She didn't protest. She took them and swallowed them down.

"I got a bath going."

"Oh, Sam. You didn't have to do that."

"You always feel better with one."

"I think I'd feel better if I ripped out my uterus."

"Don't say that." He reached over and laid a hand against her stomach, over her womb. The gesture was tender.

He wondered if she'd ever carry any of his children there. The thought had never really occurred to him before. He wasn't sure if he wanted any and she'd never mentioned children to him before. He knew that he wanted to finish law school and Jessica had her sites set on a career in research law. So it would be long time, if ever...

A flash of blood and an open c-section incision went through his mind. He winced, unsure where the image was coming from, but sorry that she planted the idea of her womb being cut open.

He blinked and drew his hand away. "Okay, baby. Let's get you to the bath."

"I don't want to stand." She whispered.

He leaned down and picked her up. She wrapped her arms around his neck and buried her head in his shoulder.

"Wow. This is some good Tylenol. Feels like I'm floating." She quipped.

He snorted and crossed into the bathroom, set her on the floor, and checked the water with his hand. He cocked an eyebrow. "You okay?"

Jessica nodded. "Sam." Her eyes were honest and grateful.

"Yeah?"

"You are the best boyfriend ever."

He smiled and his dimples deepened. "You make it pretty easy to want to try to be that."

And oddly it was then, watching the gratitude and love in her eyes, that he knew with a steadfast certainty that he wanted to spend the rest of his life with Jessica Moore.

* * *

Brady leaned against the old wooden table and loosened the top button of his Oxford shirt. "Sam, your girl can cook, man."

Sam ducked his head and peered up at him through his bangs. "Yeah, she sure can."

"Better hold onto her." Brady's eyes drifted toward the kitchen.

Thanksgiving had been a low key affair-Jessica's parents were away, so she hijacked Brady's apartment for the newer appliances and cooked a meal for the three of them.

Brady looked up to judge Sam's expression.

"Oh I'm not going anywhere, believe me."

Sam was so smitten with her. It was written all over his face.

"So you dodged a bullet not having not having to visit her family, huh?" Brady picked his tooth with his fingernail. _Damn turkey._

Sam shrugged. "Yeah... I'm just not accustomed to the whole family thing." His fox eyes slid to the kitchen again. "I don't think they're overly fond of me."

"Why not? Who the hell wouldn't like you?"

"I'm just not from, well, any kind of a decent background."

Brady rolled his eyes. "Hypocritical assholes."

Sam's face tightened. "Brady... shhh."

He shrugged. "They can't tell a boyscout when they see him because his daddy is a drunk."

To his surprise, Brady felt Sam almost bristle at the callus assessment of John Winchester- but he said nothing.

"You gonna go to her place for Christmas?"

"Yeah. I think so. Probably." Sam pushed his plate away. "Holidays are so uncomfortable for me."

"Hey." Brady said, evaluating his friend, "People go skydiving off of buildings with no parachute thanks to holidays. You aren't alone."

He saw Sam's eyes take on a curious light. "I never did ask you what you said to that Tom guy on Halloween. Did you rile him up or something?"

"He didn't need any riling. He doesn't like us much... We're so loveable that I don't know _why._ " Brady gave his best salesman smile.

Sam's dimple deepened in amusement. "Yeah. Me either." He opened his mouth, closed it again.

Brady cocked his head. "What?"

Sam huffed a long breath. "I don't...when he went for Jessica I thought I was gonna kill him, man."

"He roughed up your girl. Anyone would have done it."

"No. I mean really _kill_ him, Brady."

Brady tried to conceal the delighted light in his eye. _That_ was the Sam they needed, the Sam that was lurking under all those civilized layers waiting to be peeled like an onion. The rage he kept carefully contained within...they needed to tap into that. -Throw Sam into a position where he had no choice but to make it happen. When push came to shove, Sam was a survivor. They just had to pen him into a corner and cut off all his options to make him finally turn and fight.

Losing Jessica was going to light that rage up like a bonfire. The _coup de grace_ of the unfairness that was Sam Winchester's life.

"Sam you'd never kill anyone." Brady protested gamely. Like he believed it. Like he didn't know both Winchesters were honed killers at their core.

* * *

Christmas skated by, Sam and Jess enjoying their vacation together. The weather was pleasant and somehow Sam knew he was never going to be used to sun. Even after all this time it felt like a lie or a dream he was going to be awakened from.

* * *

Jessica Moore tilted her head sideways and smiled, her face framed by that long blonde hair that Sam loved so much. He loved to touch it, run his fingers through it, hold her by it in the heat of passion. Bury his nose in it when they were intimate. It had come to be a familiar comfort.

He watched the way it caught the light when she moved to pick up the present he'd bought her. "Oh Sam." She gave him her dazzling girlish sunlit smile. He found himself returning it.

"Go on. Open it." He leaned forward and kissed her gently on her full lips.

"Did you wrap this?" She asked, turning it over in her hands.

Sam snorted. "I made Rebecca do it, actually."

She laughed. "I didn't think you did this good a job normally."

"We weren't big into presents so I guess it's a skill I never picked up."

She got a nail under the corner of the wrap and tore it with a shredding sound. The blue paper covered with kittens and balloons tore apart like a beautiful illusion to reveal the plain parcel under neath.

She opened the white cardboard box on the inside and her face lit up.

"You went back and got me this?" She held out the crop top with a screen print of the smurfs on it. There were a pair of blue sleep shorts nestled in the tissue paper. "I can't believe you even remembered. When did we see these?"

Sam shrugged. "I think a few months ago. Happy Birthday, Jessica Moore."

She bounced off of her seat and threw her arms around him. Sam held her, feeling complete, whole.

He kissed her again. "How did I get so lucky?"

Jess pulled away. "You know, I just don't know..." She kissed the tip of his ski jump nose. "Okay, let me get ready for dinner."

She hopped off into the bedroom to change, bouncing off the edge of the chair on his antique desk as she did so. "Ow." She said rubbing her hip. "I keep forgetting I have these things."

"Hips?" Sam grinned and cocked an eyebrow. "I sure don't."

She wandered around the corner and his eye landed on the shirt she'd wanted.

 _What was the name of the girl smurf?_

Dean's voice rang sharply in his memory and a flash of surprised guilt flooded him.

 _Dean._

It was Dean's birthday too. He'd actually forgotten.

Sam swallowed and dropped his gaze to the floor. They hadn't even contacted each other for Christmas. It would be weird to send him a text now. He thought of it though, wasn't sure if he was still angry at him over their last conversation.

"Hey..."Jess poked her head around the door. "Can you zip this up?"

Sam blinked and looked up to see an expanse of bare shoulder and a bit of her rounded breast sheathed in a red dress.

"Why do you look sad?" She asked.

"I'm not sad." Sam stood up.

"Melancholy then."

He crossed the room in a few strides. "I'm not melancholy."

"You are a terrible liar." She bit her lip and pulled her hair up to expose the zipper. "Lawyer. You're gonna have to work on that."

Sam huffed. _If only she knew just how good he was..._ that secrets and lies came to him as easily as breathing. "Okay, I'll try," he said.

Sam walked around behind her, but she turned to look at him.

"What were you thinking about?"

"Dean. I almost forgot today is his birthday too."

"Oh that's right!" She turned back around. "You should text him."

Sam's eyes swept over the long elegant curve of her exposed back. He took hold of the zipper. "I don't want to open up that can of worms."

"Why not?" Jess asked, holding her hair to the side.

Sam let go of the zipper and placed his hand across her bare back, then slowly slid his palm up her muscle without closing the zipper.

"Sam..." but he could hear the smile in her voice.

"Yeah," he asked, running his hand over her shoulders, feeling his body respond to touching her.

"We have dinner reservations."

He edged his hip up against her and his hand drifted under her dress to cup her breast.

She inhaled sharply and dropped her hair. "Sam."

He leaned over and kissed her ear. "We have time."

Sam drowned himself in Jessica Moore and didn't think about his brother again until late in the night when she'd drifted to sleep.

 **Thank you so much for the reviews, NCSupfan, Shadowhuntingdd, Michele, and my guest. It would be hard to keep writing without your encouragement. Stay tuned...it's all down hill from here.**


	30. Chapter 30

It was midsummer when the cattle deaths caught Brady's attention. He'd heard the speculation at college. The Stanford Biology department was buzzing with the news. It was something challenging for their zoological epidemiology department to study. Weird things got geeks excited

It made a blip on Brady's radar for a _very_ different reason. Something was coming. When it was followed up by seemingly random crop failures (another thing that made the science geeks excited) he was fully alert. There had been no drought. No blight. Nothing that should have kicked off an obvious withering of grapes on the vine near Palo humans could sit and study the phenomenon to their heart's content, and try to come up with a scientific explanation for the freak occurrences. Laughable in and of itself because humans didn't even have the slightest _beginning_ of understanding on the phenomenon that moved their universe. Scientific or otherwise.

They could remain in the dark, as they always were. Brady knew exactly what was happening.

Azazel was readying for something big.

* * *

The house was burning. Shrouded in fire. Blonde hair was ablaze. Sam looked up and pieces of it came down as a smelly embered ash. The crackle hissed around him. He yelled out and there were hands on him.

Dean's voice. "Go! Come on, Sam! Move."

Sam couldn't.

Frozen in horror.

Dean...and then there was Dad's deep baritone. "Move it, Sam!"

And suddenly the burning figure was mom. But it flickered and then it was Dean. Dad. And finally Jessica. Jessica caught in a blaze. Crying.

"No!"

The cry tore from Sam's throat and he shot up in bed.

"Sam!" He'd startled Jessica. She'd rolled over to watch him in the dim light of the bedroom.

He took a moment to get his bearings, orient himself. It was a dream. Just a freaking dream. He tried to slow his breathing. His bangs were plastered to his forehead with sweat. He felt gross.

"I'm sorry. Go back to sleep." He told her.

He got out of bed, the floor cold against his bare feet. It felt good. The summers here were too hot.

"You okay?" She whispered. He'd heard so many different iterations of that phrase over the years. Spoken by Dean and Dad. Now Jessica. Spoken in hushed tones whenever the terrors in his mind shook him awake at night.

"Yeah. Yeah I'm good." Sam padded off to the bathroom. Nightmares were not an uncommon occurrence for him so at least Jessica wouldn't be too curious.

He turned on the faucet and splashed water over his face. His expression crumbled for a moment until he wrestled himself back under control. He was fine. She was safe.

Sam wiped his face off with a towel and pulled it away with surprise. There was a smear of blood on it. Another nosebleed. He grabbed a wad of toilet paper and packed some of it in his nose, then put the lid down on the toilet and sat, tilting his head back. He looked at the ceiling and thought of his mother burning.

* * *

The LSAT was over.

Sam blew out a breath and headed out of the testing area. He grabbed his book bag in the waiting room where he'd left it outside the testing lab. It was a black bag with room for a laptop. The worn red grimy book bag he'd arrived at Palo Alto with years ago had finally ripped beyond repair. It felt good to throw it out. He'd had it since junior high. Felt good to throw most of the stuff from that time period out if he were honest to himself.

Jess was waiting for him in the long beige hallway. "Hey..." she said cheerfully. "How'd you do?"

People crowded past them.

Sam shrugged, moving closer in the press of bodies. "I don't know. I hate standardized tests. They always make me nervous."

"You'll ace it," she replied, looking up at him with an undisguised fondness.

Sam never quite knew what to do with the faith she put in him. She believed in him when, half the time, he didn't deserve it.

He'd grown up being chastised and questioned and told he was less than. Dad didn't trust him to do the simplest of tasks. Dean never had faith that he was going to make the right choice. But here he was.

He'd made one huge choice. He'd broken off and left. And look where he was. He had a full scholarship. He'd supported himself and gone through four years of college. He had an education under his belt, real world work experience, friends he'd managed to hold onto for more than a few months, and he had _Jess._ He made the choice for Jessica. The best choice he ever made.

He discovered that the "real" world wasn't fraught with danger and death from every corner. Monsters didn't dog his foot steps. Not everyone was a struggling alcoholic. Some people were open and loving and wouldn't crush your heart.

Sam put his arm around her and waited for a clearing of people. The throng left and he stepped out into the tiled corridor. "I don't know where you get your faith in me."

She leaned into him as they walked. "It's not faith. I've seen what you can do."

"Well, what I _can_ do and how I actually perform are two different things." She was warm and comforting pressed against him. It felt so...natural, like he'd always had Jess on his arm.

"Its not Faith when I've seen you take tests. You always ace them."

"It's still faith that I'm gonna do it again." He reasoned.

"But you've always done it. So I gotta say, statistically, you're pretty awesome."

He grinned widely, feeling his heart swell.

They stepped out into the sun and Sam felt a stab of pain behind his eyes. He yelped and shrank against the brick of the building. He could feel the sand paper texture on his back, biting through his cotton t-shirt.

Jess was over him as he crouched down a little, grabbing his nose. "Hey what's wrong? You having one of your migraines?"

Sam nodded stiffly. "Yeah."

"Okay." Jess said as he sat heavily on the pavement.

She touched his shoulder. "There's no hurry. If you want to go stand inside where it's dark I can get the car and pull it around to pick you up."

Just as quickly as it had come, the pain started to lift.

He sighed with relief.

"I'm okay." He slowly unfolded himself as he rose from the ground and stood up.

"We should really pay attention to your triggers." She said.

"Yeah," Sam agreed. "LSAT. Trigger to avoid. Got it."

She laughed. "You're such a dork."

He could feel her eyes on him. "Really though. You should get them checked out if they keep up like this. You've had them a lot the past month."

He shrugged. "It's just stress."

"Have you always had them with stress?"

 _No._ He thought. _  
_

"Yes," he lied. "It's fine, Jess."

 **Thanks to Michele, Melissa, Catherine, ShadowHuntingDD, WaitingforAslan, , ayosb200, Dom Darkwolf and Kim for the feedback. You are all awesome. I'm having fun picking up speed now!**


	31. Chapter 31

Sam Winchester glanced around the apartment, taking in the home and space he and Jess had created together. Actually "together" was too strong a word. It was mostly a space _Jessica_ had created for him. Out of the spartan look of the old apartment with its decent sized rooms, neutral paint colors and wooden flooring _she_ had created a home for him.

She had a green thumb and a love of growing things. Every available window that got decent light had a houseplant parked in front of it. She'd brought in furniture from her parents, lamps, chairs, even an old gourd repurposed into a vase. Her art work-with a tendency to the abstract-stood on an easel in their living room. She wasn't always tidy and thus the apartment had a lived in look with clothes lying draped over the arm of the couch or a DVD lying here or there.

It was all Jessica. Sam's contribution was a shelf full of books and the old antique desk he'd rescued from the curbside.

And yet...he didn't mind. At all. He was surrounded by Jessica. And Jessica meant home. Meant safety. Meant Love.

He moved a half empty coffee cup left on his desk. The rim had left a slight watermark and he wiped his hand over the slight warp in the wood. Coasters. They needed coasters.

His fingernail traced the groove of the old wood and he moved to tidy a few papers. He saw a sheet of discarded printer paper in the stack that she'd scrawled _I love Sam_ and _Jess and Sam Forever_ on and his mouth curled up into a smile. It was stupid, even juvenile, but it warmed his heart.

He grabbed a pen and wrote: _I love you too_. But when he tried to scrawl it, the ink had dried and he only dragged the ball tip over the surface of the paper. He pressed harder and retraced his line. Finally the ink started flowing again and he rewrote it then set it aside.

Sam looked down at the desk top and realized that his pressing so hard had left an indentation in the varnish of the soft wood. Only visible at the right angle to catch the light, the desktop read _I love you too._

Sam Winchester was not an impulsive man. He'd seldom done things on a whim without thinking them through, but despite his natural sobriety, there was a dichotomy in his nature because he also trusted his instincts. Thinking got in the way of instinct.

Thus the idea to propose to Jessica was a well thought out plan with all options considered, but _I love you too_ carved into the desktop had awakened his instincts. And thus he set about acting on them.

* * *

Brady could feel the building storm from where he was inside his apartment. The charged ions of the atmosphere, the sense of impending power brewing, ready to explode. There had been more cattle deaths. Crop failures. All signs that demons were on the move. Most likely Azazel or others of their kind gathering power, telling Brady it was nearing time to act. He, himself, would cause mayhem with the weather when he finally put plan into action.

The hooker in his bed room was passed out from too many drugs and she barely moved when he grabbed her by her tangled mop of fake blonde hair and slit her throat to let the blood drain. He caught it in a chalice, licked his lips as his eyes went black.

Brady watched her bleed out in fascination. How the partly viscous fluid dripped ruby into the gold of the cup. It didn't behave quite like water, the consistency all wrong. Fascinating stuff, blood.

Somewhere, in the very back of his mind, he could hear Tyson Brady, the _real_ Tyson Brady protesting weakly in distress. So the kid _was_ still alive back there, despite being quiet for so long. He made a mental footnote that he would have to dispatch of him soon. The Demon Brady was keeping this meat suit. It was a great one and he wasn't planning on sharing.

He dropped his voice into a language older than Latin. The chalice swirled. The red coalesced into yellow eyes.

"I'm awaiting your instructions."

Brady paused, tilting his head, listening to the smooth voice from the other side.

Brady nodded once. "November the second. I understand." He said.

Sam Winchester was going to lose Jessica _exactly_ as he'd lost his mother. And Brady was going to do the honors.

* * *

Sam paused awkwardly near the Jewelry counter in the Midtown Mall. He didn't step into the carpeted space, he sort of hovered awkwardly, one foot on the line where the store was tucked behind a few pillars. Rows of glass cases and bright lights greeted his vision and he bit his lip, tentative, unsure.

He hovered near the entrance for another moment or two, his eyes roaming over the various pieces of jewelry. -Necklaces and bracelets, pins, rings. So many adornments that sparkled in colored stones of greens and blues and ambers. So many little stones and precious metals that cost the equivalent of a month's rent. Sometimes more. The sheer wastefulness of it struck Sam as odd.

A sales associate was scoping him out. She caught his eye.

 _Dammit._

He dropped his gaze -hoping to get away before he was accosted, but it was too late.

A trim woman Sam estimated to be in her fifties approached him. She was attractive except for mildly sun damaged skin. Too many tans as a college youth.

Unbidden, the thought crossed his mind that too much brightness could be as detrimental to a person as too much darkness.

"Hi honey." She said cheerfully. "Can I help you?"

"Umm. Just looking." Sam replied awkwardly, subconsciously backing a step.

She gave a knowing smile. Her name tag read Elena. "Looking for something for your girlfriend?"

"Y...yeah." he replied.

"A present... or..." her dark eyes measured him as she spoke. "Or are you thinking of popping the question?" She read the answer in his expression before he replied. "Awww. Congratulations. Does she know or is it a surprise?"

"I'm fairly certain she'll accept but I'm... I haven't quite told her yet."

"Oh that's so exciting!" She replied. He had a hard time figuring out what was genuine and what was honed salesmanship. "What's her style. What's she like?"

"Uh." He shrugged, feeling himself shrink a little.

Elena took his arm gently, as if he were a colt that might spook and led him over to the counter with diamond rings glinting under the lights. "Everything depends on your budget. You can get something big and flawed or something smaller with no imperfections for the same price."

Sam's gaze fell on the different cuts and sizes of the rings in the case.

"It all depends on how flawed the diamond is." She pointed between a few, her manicured finger clicking on the glass. "See how some of them pick up the light more? Those are the better cut ones with no occlusions."

Sam's mouth went a little dry.

"Wow." He wiped a hand across his forehead. "I am not prepared for this at all."

She looked at him with a sympathetic air that he figured was probably genuine. Older women often responded to something in his boyish looks and mannerisms. "What's her personality like? What's her style?"

"She's..." he paused. "She's casual. She a little on the hippie side, I guess... I'm bad at this."

She laughed. "Most guys are. I tell you what. Here is my card." She drew a card from the brass holder on the glass counter and slipped it to Sam. "You figure out your budget...snoop around her jewelry to find out what size and shaped rings she wears. And then come back to me, okay?"

Sam nodded. "Yeah. Okay."

The nebulous idea to propose to Jessica at the end of the year seemed suddenly solidified with the business card clutched in his hand.

He never even noticed the demon wearing his handsome square-jawed friend observing him from the shadows of a nearby store.

* * *

Brady leaned up against a pillar at the mall and watched Sam slow at every jewelry store he passed.

The demon kept his distance, but observed him keenly, like a big cat stalking prey. He really didn't tire of watching the young Winchester. It kept his senses sharp. Made him feel predatory. Dangerous.

Except for times like this when Sam made it all too easy. No wariness in the young man any more. No hunter's senses. Just a mild mannered sack of shit. As Azazel had feared, Sam was becoming soft.

Even though the kid's tussle with the demon who currently called himself Tom showed that Sam still had steel deep down-that steel wore away away a little more each week. Such a damned shame.

He left the mall and stepped into the sunlight.

There was no nip to the air in Palo Alto in October. No ominous announcement of impending hardship and winter.

It was fucking paradise, really. Brady loved it. Hedonism at its best. Much harder to be hedonistic while freezing your ass off half the year in some shit hole like New York. Here it was easy to party all fucking night, stay up in hot tub til dawn. Start over again. He loved it here.

Too bad his tenure wouldn't last forever. He was about to test Sam's mettle.

 **So many great reviews last chapter! Dom Darkwolf, Nonon Bane, ncsupfan, Michele, waitingforAslan, shadowhuuntingdd, fluffydragon Thank you! Hang in there... destruction and mayhem ahead.**


	32. Chapter 32

**October 5**

The house was on fire. Sam was lying in a crib, the shadow of a mobile above him. The fire licked the walls around him. But he was frozen. He couldn't move. Latex paint and wallpaper bubbled and peeled, sheet rock melted and burst into brightness. A white dress in the flame and blonde hair. _Jessica._ She was bleeding.

He couldn't move. Dad's arms lifted him up. _Was it Dad?_ That face was all wrong.

* * *

Sam awakened again. This time he'd done it quietly enough that Jess only stirred as she rolled over.

Sam stood up, clad only in his boxers and a tee shirt and wandered to the kitchen. He took a few slow breaths to calm the gallop of his heartbeat and ran his fingers through his hair. ' _It's okay. It was a dream. Just a bad dream.'_

He crouched down and dug under the sink, rummaging through tubs of cleaning supplies and some rubber gloves before his hand seized the handle of his little bare bones tool box. He pulled it out with the clatter of knocked over Windex and placed it on the counter.

He sighed and nudged the cupboard closed with his foot, armed himself with a screwdriver and pried off each smoke alarm to check it over before he put it back. Then he wandered to the individual electrical box in their apartment behind the door of the closet off their kitchen.

He cut the power and slowly, methodically began to turn them on and off to test the circuit breaker. He wasn't terribly adept at wiring or electricity but checking the circuit breaker and taking a peak behind each power switch for a ratty connective wire that might start a fire... _that_ he could do.

The wiring in the apartment seemed fine. But he threw away the candle that Jess had in the living room. He'd tell her he'd accidentally knocked it over and broken it.

* * *

 **October 10**

The leather chair Jess had brought from her parents made a creaking sound as Sam moved in it. He leaned his head back against the wall and sighed, then stood up and dropped the newspaper onto the cushion. He usually tried to avoid the paper, but old habits died hard and if he was able to get a hold of one, he couldn't resist the temptation to scan the headlines for anything strange.

Sometimes Sam went months without picking up the paper and then sometimes there was an old one available in a diner somewhere or the cafeteria and his old snooping skills kicked into high gear. Today he hadn't found anything unusual. He breathed a sigh of relief around the constriction in his chest and felt it loosen a little.

Most days he felt the most content he'd ever felt in his life. In fact, he hadn't known what contentment felt like before he met Jessica. However, lately there was a growing sense of unease that sometimes struck him. Some weird feeling of impending doom that he couldn't quite shake off. He had been slow to trust that this was his life. That this existence he had constructed was a real and viable thing. Something solid and something that he had autonomy over and was his.

If only he knew.

But sometimes it's better to not know. Some secrets are too dark.

* * *

 **October 15**

Sam pulled Jessica close to him on the couch. A crack of thunder peeled through the air and the lights flickered and went out. The TV blinked off.

"Well, damn." She said beside him. "There goes the power. What is with the weather this week?" She flipped open her cell phone to illuminate the room and started to get off the couch. "I have that candle somewhere."

Sam shook his head. "Jess about that, I uh, knocked it off the table and broke it."

"Sam! That was one of my apple spice ones."

"I'm sorry. Hey," he tugged on her arm. "Come sit."

"We can't do anything in the dark."

"I can think of lots of things we can do in the dark," Sam said with mischief in his eye.

* * *

 **October 17**

 _"The Primroses were over."_

The thought echoed through Sam's mind as he sat in class. He blinked, trying to figure out where he'd even heard it before.

The lecture faded out and he had to pull his focus back to the professor. Sam had a way of directing his attention with laser precision if he needed to, but when he didn't have to, he could doodle in the margins of his notebooks while the teacher talked and still somehow walk out of class with a 4.0.

He knew his memory gave him an advantage over a lot of students. Sam could hear information once and regurgitate it later with near perfect recall when put on the spot. His brother didn't have that ability and he wondered if that's partly why Dean did so badly in school.

Sam could never quite untangle whether it was Dean's attitude that caused him to not pay attention in class or if at some point he'd not been able to keep up with the information being given and had stopped paying attention. It could go either way with his brother.

Taking notes on a laptop had put a dent in Sam's doodling habit. Instead he stretched out one of his long legs as much as he could in the cramped lecture hall and rolled his neck-and had random quotes run through his head.

 _The Primroses were over._

 _The fields are covered in blood._

He blinked.

Of course. The opening words to _Watership Down._ Although why the hell it had popped into his mind in the middle of a lecture, he had no clue. He hadn't read that book in years upon years.

A tale of two brothers leaving their home on the whim of the younger with his blood filled visions of ruin.

A tale of two _brothers._

 _The fields are covered in blood. The Primroses were over._

Sam shook his head to clear it and snapped his laptop closed as class was dismissed.

* * *

 **October 18**

The ceiling was burning. Blonde hair lit from within burning gold and then yellow and red. Shades of blue at the center. It licked and fanned and then swirled and headed toward Sam.

"The fields are covered in blood!" He was yelling it at Dean, who watched him with a knowing green eye.

"I believe you, Sammy." He said. "Dad said to stay here."

Dean's eye reflected the burning flames behind them. Red and oranges that swirled together into yellow. Yellow that took over the entirety of his iris.

He blinked and suddenly they were the hazel eyes of his father. John's face twisted into a frown of torment. "Shoot me, son! You have to shoot me!" His baritone cut through the sound of the crackle pop of flames eating the house and then an explosion.

And Sam awoke panting. He sat upright in the darkness of his room and tried to calm his breathing. His face scrunched up and he realized that he was crying. He wiped a forearm over his eyes and pushed the feeling of trapped panic back down. He swallowed hard and looked at Jessica lying beside him.

She stirred. "You okay?" She asked sleepily.

"Yeah." Sam laid back down and gathered her into his arms. She dropped her head into his chest and was back asleep before his tears dried.

 **Oh Sammy...I'm so sorry. Thanks for the reviews, guys. Stay tuned.**


	33. Chapter 33

**October 25th**

Sam Winchester opened his lap top and checked his email. It was the last day of the window when test scores were supposed to be released. His computer was taking forever to load and he leaned his arm on the antique desk and stretched his long leg out before him. He chewed absently on his nail while he waited.

Jessica stopped baking and knocked the oven closed with her knee as she tried to wipe her hands off on a kitchen towel. "Did ya get the results?" She called, poking her head around the corner.

Sam didn't look up at her. "I don't know. This thing is taking forever to load." He logged into his account and let out an audible breath as he read. "Yeah. Yeah they're in."

"And…" he heard Jessica rinsing her fingers. "What's the score?"

"It's here." Sam clicked on the email. He bounced his leg nervously until the screen loaded. He let out another huff of air as he opened the attachment.

 **Test scores for Samuel Winchester.**

 **175.**

He felt the tension drain out of his shoulders with utter relief.

"Well?" Jessica walked over while Sam was still digesting the information.

He was in the 99th percentile of test takers.

"I did pretty good," he said.

Jessica glanced over his shoulder. "Pretty good? Oh my god, Sam! That's awesome!" She grabbed his neck from behind in an exuberant hug.

Sam allowed himself a relaxed grin and leaned back into her embrace.

She stepped around front of him, using his shoulders as a swivel point and straddled his lap with a wide smile that he couldn't help but return.

"My boyfriend is a genius!" She praised. Her expression was glowing. She was so damned radiant when she was happy that Sam didn't have the words to even describe it.

"You're the smartest person I've ever met. I mean and I'm no slouch." She gave him a wink.

He blushed. Sam's reactions vacillated between eating up the praise and being somewhat embarrassed by it. The way Jess bragged his abilities up was very foreign to him and he had a hard time emotionally processing it even though they'd been together for over a year and a half.

"Well I'm pretty smart to have chosen you, I have to say." He hooked his hands under her thighs and adjusted her seat on him with a smile full of mischievous promise. Something that belonged more on his brother's face then his own, although Jessica was often on the receiving end of this rare Sam Winchester expression.

She was having none of it yet, still enraptured with victorious jubilation rather than where she'd led his body to take his mind. "You did so awesome! You know you're going to nail that scholarship. Whatever internship you need...it's all yours."

"Hey let's not get carried away." He protested and she put her hand over his mouth.

He raised his eyebrow expressively.

"Yes!" She said. "Let's get carried away. Let's just be happy for a minute over a freaking amazing accomplishment. Let's be happy that you missed one question on a test that is elite."

She took her had away and replaced it with her lips. Sam melted under her, let her take the lead for a moment until she got him fired up and he returned it with building enthusiasm, wrapping his arms around her slender body on his.

She broke away, her full lips glistening and wet from him. "Let's get carried away."

Sam tilted his head. "I don't know what I'd do without you. I don't know who I'd be."

"You know that guy that hangs outside Jack in the Box?"

"The one with the big beard and the shirt he wears backwards?"

"Yeah. That'd be you."

Sam laughed and watched her bounce with the contraction and release of his abdominal and chest muscles.

It lit something lustful in him and he dove for her lips again, scooted his arms back under her thighs. He picked up her weight as if she were nothing.

"Sam," she laughed, tilting her head back as he kissed her chin while she was being carried. "What are you doing?"

She locked her ankles around his back.

"You're getting carried away." He replied.

"Oh! That is the worst pun ever."

"Sorry," he mumbled, tossing her onto the bed. "I'll try harder."

Jessica didn't unwrap her legs as he tossed her and she brought Sam down with her in a surprised heap. He laughed squashing her beneath his weight on accident and trying to get purchase on the floor with his stockinged feet.

His sock slipped on the hard wood as Jess pulled him off balance. "I'm gonna crush you." He warned as she clung on to him, trying to wrestle him down.

She was agile and fairly tall for a woman, it made her a harder opponent than he'd expected. Sam laughed breathlessly as he tried to extract himself from her; he finally admitted defeat and made a controlled fall onto the mattress at her side. He could hear himself laughing along with her girlish giggle and he wondered at the sound. It was a beautiful audio-one he'd never heard before her. Satisfied that she'd won the round, Jessica climbed on top of him and his smile faded into something intent as she straddled either side of his hips. Her warm thighs touched him, made him feel content.

He loved it when she asserted herself with him. Jessica Moore on top of him was the most stunning view in the world. One he'd never forget. He let the cascade of her curls and the blue of her eyes burn into his memory as she leaned down to touch her lips to his.

* * *

 **October 27  
**

Sam watched Jessica unfold her obligatory sexy nurses uniform and gave her a rakish grin. "Wow. I never had any nurses that looked like you before."

She looked up from the mess of fabric on the bed, her blonde hair in a wild tangle and smiled. "You spend a lot of time at the doctors?"

"No. But I sure would if you were there to give me a sponge bath."

She rolled her eyes. "So predictable, Winchester."

He cocked his head with the boyish smile that always worked on her. "I'm a guy."

"Thank God you told me." She said, peeling off her tank top and shoving the dress over her head. She got it stuck for a second and Sam watched with mild amusement. " _I_ may need a doctor after I dislocate my arm to get this on."

She wiggled it down over her figure triumphantly. "Tada!"

Sam's dimples deepened. "I love you." He said.

"I love you too."

"So much that we don't have to go to Jerry's party this year?" He pushed playfully.

"Not that much." She told him with a wink.

Sam frowned.

"Oh come on, Sam. We're not going to run into that asshole again."

"Probably not. But..." he sighed. "I still hate parties."

"I know," she returned. "All those friends and fun. They're terrible."

She walked over to him, sky high bare legs in a little white skirt. Plunging neckline. Sam let his eyes trace her body a second before he brought them back to her face.

She wrapped her arms around his neck and smiled up at him. "It's just for a bit."

He sighed "Okay, okay."

She gave him a kiss and Sam closed his eyes and relaxed into her.

"Can you wear this later tonight?" He asked, nuzzling her ear.

She wrapped a hand in the back of his shirt. "Do you have a fever?"

"Yeah." Sam said, deadpan. "Maybe a hernia too. You better check."

She tossed her head back and laughed at the unexpectedly brazen comment and gave him a swat on his back side.

"Sorry," he said. "I think maybe I'm channeling Dean."

"Well," she pecked him on the lips. "I only want Sam. But I gotta say I like this side of him. You should let him come out and play more."

Sam crushed her to him and closed his eyes against an unexpected wave of emotion that hit him out of nowhere. He'd never wanted anything as badly in his life as he wanted her. He wished he knew how to verbalize how much he loved her. But then he looked into her eyes and suddenly knew that she knew.

* * *

 **October 29**

"Dad. It's me. Call me." Dean Winchester snapped his phone shut and paced the motel room. The place hadn't been updated or probably cleaned since the seventies. The gold shag carpet was covered in stains and cigarette burns. The mattress sagged in the middle.

He crossed his arms in front of his chest and paced a circle like a caged panther as he thought. The light from the lamp caught the shine on his full bottom lip. He kicked the edge of the bed savagely and the old metal frame and box spring lurched sideways with an ominous metallic ting. "Come on, Dad!"

Dean had been trying to pick up his father's trail for weeks. John had just disappeared into thin air in a way so uncharacteristically ominous that Dean's whole nervous system was on edge. Something was wrong, he knew it down to his soul.

Even when they were hunting apart, they never stayed out of contact for long. John's behavior had been strange for the last several months. His father had always been a secretive sonofabitch, but the behavior leading up to his disappearance found him even more withdrawn and taciturn than normal. Dean initially dismissed it as some alcoholic induced depression that his father was prone to, but there was a little warning system in the back of his mind that told him something else was afoot.

Then he'd disappeared. And Dean had called every number, every contact looking for him. He'd retraced where John might have been in every shithole he could think of. The only thing he'd turned up was Dad's Journal that was obviously intentionally left for him to find tossed in the glove compartment of the Impala.

So yeah this was weird. This was _batshit, piss-your-pants, something-is-fucking-wrong_ weird. And he was in it alone. Utterly alone without Dad.

Everybody fucking left him. They _all_ fucking did. He was sick of it and he wasn't going to deal with this by himself.

Dean grabbed his duffle and slammed the door behind him.

He settled behind the wheel of his black '67 Chevy Impala and heard the deep savage growl of her engine start up as he turned the key. He let her idle for a minute and ran a hand through his shortly cropped brown hair. He threw her into reverse and pulled out of the parking lot.

Almost without conscious thought, Dean pointed her west toward California.


	34. Chapter 34

**Halloween**

The veil was at its thinnest. Magic at its strongest. Especially in the parts of the world where the Great Dying of Autumn had begun.

Palo Alto was not the cold northeast, but the effect was still potent.

For all their primitive stupidity, early man had understood some truths that modern man did not.

Brady could feel the veil thinning. The curtain that separated the worlds. His senses became keener, his sense of self more powerful. There was an elation to it.

He'd eschewed other festivities to keep an eye on Sam, dropped into Jerry's party briefly to keep tabs. Jessica was dressed as a nurse, and _oh God,_ did Brady want her to violate him in any "medical" way see saw fit.

She was bragging about Sam's LSAT score. Sam, as usual, was slightly embarrassed by the praise. Hanging at the party with his usual quiet uncomfortable air.

Brady mingled for a minute before his senses told him to leave and paused on his way outside into the humid night air. He sensed something. _Knew_ it with every bit of his twisted Demon soul and all the pre-cognizance that provided.

Sam's life was about to be on a collision course into an event that would wreck him. Would throw him back into the world he'd tried so hard, so valiantly to leave.

And with _perfect_ timing-timing _so perfect_ that it suggested Destiny rather than Coincidence- something was about to happen. Something that would make that reality come to fruition with such delicious permanence that Sam would never be able to extract himself from that life again.

Dean Winchester was on his way to Palo Alto.

* * *

Dean turned on Baby's windshield wipers as he headed West through a random electrical storm. It was just weird enough to get his attention for a moment or two, but just usual enough to write off as a weird weather pattern caused by Global Warming or whatever the hell was the new buzzword being passed around was. Dean's profession gave him a larger understanding of meteorology than the lay person, but he'd never delved deeply into the natural phenomenon that caused different weather the way that Bobby Singer or his father had.

Had?

 _Did._ Dean corrected himself adamantly, feeling the gnawing fear settle in the pit of his stomach again.

Dean wrestled it back down with a steadfast bravery he'd had since his childhood. It was instinct.

 _Fear was immobilizing. Stamp it out. Act. Don't examine it again._

His father had gone missing before. It was not unheard of for John Winchester to drop off the radar for a few days either following a new lead or on an alcohol fueled binge. But not for this long... and of all the times he'd disappeared, Dean had never had this kind of feeling about it.

There was just something... _different_ this time around. Hunter's Intuition? The instinct of a son who studied his father's every habit? He couldn't tell.

All he knew was that he was _alone._ Deep down-though he would die before he admitted it aloud- he was scared. And his first impulse, his overriding instinct was to go find his oldest ally.

 _Sam._

Dean's anger toward his brother had cooled over the years to the point that he wasn't even quite sure what they had fought about last.

But he knew Sam.

Sam was slower to anger, but when he finally did...he didn't forget. He carried a grudge that rivaled his father's capacity for anger at times.

There had been so many arguments between the two where Dean had wanted to grab both of them by the scruff of their necks and knock their heads together. But he hadn't. He had played Peacemaker. Negotiator. Helluva lot of good that had done them in the end.

He'd thought of calling Sam, giving him a heads up that he was on his way, but somewhere in the back of his mind he knew that such a gesture only gave Sam the opportunity to rebuff his attempt at reconciliation. That was if the kid would even have answered his phone at this point.

But Dean also knew that if he showed up on Sam's doorstep looking for help, his little brother would not, _could not_ turn him down.

 _Checkmate you stubborn bitch._

* * *

Brady lingered in the shadows outside of the big old house that was currently Sam Winchester's apartment.

He watched them come walking home at a reasonable hour, Sam slightly more relaxed that he had been at the party. After the initial nerves of courtship had passed, the young man was always more relaxed with Jessica Moore. They had fallen into a comfortable routine. It was lovely actually.

Brady thought for a moment about how easily Sam had slipped into the role of scholar and boyfriend. Responsible citizen. Hard worker. His past had done virtually nothing to impede his progress. It was odd in a way. He should have been so full of scars like his older brother, that adapting to a normal life would have been next to impossible.

Yet here he was- nice apartment, good friends, an excellent school and work record. A beautiful girl in a long term relationship. At only twenty two years old and coming in from left field with disadvantages so strong that he wasn't just starting a few steps behind his peers- he was starting in the fucking _basement._ A locked one.

And yet he'd passed them all.

It was around one in the morning and the veil between the worlds was still at its thinnest and most vulnerable when Brady's sharp ears caught the low growling rumble of a classic muscle car pulling ever closer. Dean Winchester had arrived right around the Witching Hour to go fetch his brother from his self-imposed exile. And unbeknownst to either of them, throw him back into the middle of chaos.

Dean didn't park right in the driveway, he'd pulled into a lot beside it. The old, mean looking black car rumbled to a halt and Dean cut the engine. She was silenced. He turned off the headlights and they blinked out like the light being snuffed from a victim's eyes at the moment of death. Live and electric and one minute- cold and lifeless the he next.

The door squeaked open and out stepped Dean Winchester, all worn-in boot cut jeans and military styled hair. He had a dangerous edge to him, an awareness of his surroundings that suggested both predator and prey. But mostly predator.

He was everything that Brady had pictured and a lot of what he hadn't predicted. The rough edge, he had known would be a part of him. But the boyish hint of vulnerability so very like Sam. _That_ was fresh. That was unexpected.

He had long bowed legs, full lips visible even from a distance and high cheekbones. A heart breaker who treaded the edge of beautiful...in fact _was_ masculinely beautiful but tried to rough it up with leather and attitude.

The silent way he slipped to the door, cat-like and fluid as a shadow passing over a brick wall suggested someone used to the darkness- unfazed by it. Someone who could navigate its mysteries and the horrors with a self-confidence born of familiarity and practice. This man would not adapt to life outside of what he had been raised in with any sort of Sam's ease.

Dean was born to the job. Brady watched Dean twist a paperclip from his pocket and use it to jimmy the lock. He paused once to look over his shoulder into the impenetrable darkness, eyes searching, almost like some instinct told him he was being watched.

Brady melted further into the shadows, the blackness of his eyes matching his surroundings.

Dean seemed to shrug the feeling off and went back to working the lock, his head cocked with his ear to the door until he heard the tell tale click and he flashed a cocky smile.

He was good, Brady had to give him that. Not only quiet, efficient with an energy like live wire running through him, but he'd tracked Sam's location down after years of no contact with impunity.

Dean opened the door and slipped inside.

* * *

Brady followed Dean's trail to the unlocked door. No salt, no warding. He looked up and observed a half opened window to catch the cool Palo Alto night air. Probably wasn't protected either.

Sam Winchester was getting complacent.

Brady strained his ears, decided to go inside a few feet. He stopped his breathing to listen up the winding staircase.

He couldn't hear anything but the hum of someone's fan, so he retreated outside and stood beneath the opened windows.

He heard the tussle first. Sam must have noticed an intruder before Dean had gotten very far. So his survival instincts _weren't_ all gone... he must have been sleeping lightly to sense someone was in his apartment at all.

 _Good boy._

The match was short. A few body slams. Some grunts from the brothers.

And then Dean's voice broke through the thick night air. "Woah, easy Tiger!"

Sam's voice, filled with shock and disbelief. _"Dean?_ You scared the crap out of me."

"That's because you're out of practice."

A car went by, drowning out the next few exchanges. The light flipped on. Brady caught something about smurfs.

The rest was lost again, mumbled tenor voices together-one softer and one that would be a baritone given time and age.

Brady liked baritone voices. There was something pleasurable about hearing screams tear from their throats like a wounded big cat taken down by a trophy hunter.

"Dad's on a hunting trip and he hasn't been home in a few days."

He heard mention of their father. John had gone missing. He had not been apprised of what had happened on the John front. That's obviously what had driven older brother to swallow his pride and attempt a kiss and make up after all this time.

Such beautiful timing. The tone of their voices told Brady that reconciliation was inevitable. Sam was a bit put off by big brother breaking into his house at 1 am but there was no real animosity in the tone and Dean's friendly breezy banter would wear down Sam's reserve in no time.

So it was with no surprise that Brady eventually heard the door to the side entrance clatter open and the voices out that way before the growl of the muscle car started up and the long black impala pulled out into the street and was gone in a haze of red tail lights.

Brady stepped out of the shadows and looked up at the open window. He saw Jessica Moore's lithe, athletic body moving behind the diaphanous undulating sheers as they stirred in the breeze.

 _Alone._ She would be utterly alone.

It was perfect.


	35. Chapter 35

**November 2**

Sam watched the darkened miles fly by as Dean accelerated his Baby.

He'd surreptitiously listened to the voice mail Jessica had sent him several times just to hear the sound of her voice. That sweet female tone saying that she loved him. He'd thrown her a little by disappearing on no notice with his brother- a stranger to her- with no word as to where they were going or when they'd be back. She didn't sound angry in the voice mail. He didn't think there'd be too much damage control to perform when he returned. She was too good to him. Too good to be true, really. He missed her. Even with only a few days separation, he could feel himself _pining_ for her.

As for his part, Dean looked tired and reflective. Sam announcing that he wanted to return to Stanford instead of following Dad's trail to Colorado had taken the wind out of his sails.

They'd been driving in silence for a half hour- each lost in his own thoughts.

There was an easiness to the way they interacted with each other. A way of being together that worked even with no verbal cues between them. They instinctively knew what the other was thinking. What the other needed.

Except with this.

Dean didn't understand that as familiar as this foray with his brother had been- Sam needed Jessica. He needed Stanford and normalcy. This case had reminded him of how much he hated the adrenaline spike of horror when shit went sideways. How much he hated the bumps and bruises and sore muscles. How much he hated feeling like one of them or both of them was going to die.

He wanted to go back to his own life. He'd always regret on some level that Dean couldn't seem to be a part of it- but for the first time he could remember, he was content. He was secure. He was... _happy?_

He wished with all his might that Dean could _feel_ that way. Content and secure and grounded. That was his wish for his brother...to find some semblance of what Sam, himself, had found.

He wished him Love.

 **November 2**

The Demon Brady tucked the silken white slip into the inside breast pocket of his coat and entered the bottom floor of Sam's apartment building.

The Winchesters were heading back. He could sense it. He knew that Sam would not skip out on the interview he had set up for Monday.

They'd just miss the electrical storm caused by the demonic ritual Brady had performed to ramp up his powers. The ozone was still strong in the air. It actually felt like there may be another one gathering.

He breathed it in, tasting the power. Feeling the high that came from knowing he was about to let out every part of his nature that he'd locked down for most of his stay in Tyson Brady's body. He was going to hurt that pure, innocent girl. She was almost like a virgin sacrifice being sent to appease an angry volcano.

 _Tale as old as time... Beauty and the Beast,_ he thought wryly.

Brady climbed the staircase and knocked on the door.

He heard Jessica call "Just a minute!"

She opened it and smiled warmly, clearly a little surprised to see him. "Sam isn't here. He should be back tomorrow."

Brady nodded. "Hey, can I come in?"

"Sure." She swung open the door. The smell of baking chocolate chip cookies hit his senses.

"Oh that smells awesome!" He replied, not having to fake the enthusiasm. Who didn't love cookies?

"I'm making some for Sam. They're his favorite." She turned her back to him to walk to the old stove. She put on an oven mitt and took out a tray. "If I leave these in for like a minute too long, they burn, you know?"

"Oh, I know." Brady replied, eyeing her ass in the fitting pair of cut offs she wore. Her tanned legs strong and lithe. He wanted them wrapped around him.

"Burning a batch is such a...waste." he said, trailing the last word.

Jess set the cookies on the stove top to cool and slid in another tray, noting the little egg timer she had going on the counter. "It really is."

"So where is Sam?"

She turned around and took off the mitt, her face open and innocent. "Would ya believe his brother came into town."

"Dean?"

"Yeah! His brother Dean!" She snorted. "Do you believe it... after all this time? I was starting to feel like he was a figment of Sam's imagination."

Brady walked over and poked his head into the fridge to grab a beer.

Jess sat down at their little bistro table.

God she was beautiful. Almost angelic at times with that glowing skin and blonde hair that caught the light like spun gold. He wondered how often Sam was buried in her and felt unworthy. Like he was an earthbound creature and she was divinity.

Brady popped the beer can open so hard he broke off the tab. He tossed it into the sink with a little aluminum jangle. "How'd that go?" He asked, taking a sip.

"Well it was a little...awkward. ...kinda weird...he broke into the house in the middle of the night so it's not like I had much warning to get an impression of him. He said their dad went missing off on a binge drinking hunting trip." She tilted her head, her big blue eyes suddenly sad. "This sounded like it was a recurrent theme."

"Broke into your house. What an asshole."

"Kinda...but...Sam...Sam needs family." She said with her usual good nature. "It's good. I think they'll reconcile."

Brady studied her. "What do you think of him?"

She shrugged. "He's nothing like Sam. That's for sure." She traced a nail across the table absently. "But I want him to have family. I know he loves his brother."

Brady nodded. "That he does."

He settled across from her at the little table and took a sip. Their eyes met for a moment and he saw Jessica have a flash of something uncomfortable in her eyes before she looked away. Some gut sense that prey got before the lion springs. Women were taught to ignore that danger sense, shove it away to be polite. Brady knew that Jess, being a nice girl, would brush that little internal warning aside.

"So what did you drop by for?" The timer pinged and she got up and took out her second batch.

"Ah, bored..." Brady replied. "Wanted to see if Sammy could come out and play."

She set the tray on the counter and her hand slipped. She hissed as it touched the side of her wrist. "Ow! Dammit."

"Better run that under cold water." Brady offered helpfully.

Jessica turned on the tap. "I'm such such a clutz sometimes."

She ran her palm under the stream until the pain subsided and she shut the water off. "Barely stings. I think I got lucky."

Brady stood up and meandered into the living room doorway. He noted a book open on Sam's antique desk.

"What are you reading?" He asked, heading over.

Jess followed him. "Hamlet."

"Ahhh." He settled in the chair and read the paragraph that the student copy was opened to:

 _But, good my brother,_

 _Do not, as some ungracious pastors do,_

 _Show me the steep and thorny way to heaven;_

 _Whiles, like a puff'd and reckless libertine,_

 _Himself the primrose path of dalliance treads,_

 _And recks not his own rede._

He paused thoughtfully and took another swig of beer. "The only way to heaven is the steep and thorny path."

Jess shook her head. "You're such a cynic. Although I'm apt to agree sometimes." She paused and glanced around the room. "Are you cold? It's freezing in here."

Jessica crossed her arms and walked over to close a window.

The wind had picked up outside with the sound of trees being lashed as the second storm of the night blew in out of nowhere. Jess looked up in time to watch a jagged streak of lightning split the sky. "Wow!"

The lights flickered off.

"Powers gone." Brady flicked his lighter on so they could see their surroundings. "You have candles around?"

Jess tipped her head. "Ummm. I'm not sure."

She pulled out her cell to use the light of it to see and it beeped and the screen went black. "Seriously? This was a full battery, I swear."

Brady didn't bother to conceal his black eyes in the darkness. "Strange things happen during storms. I hope you have the laptop unplugged. Power surge will toast everything."

Jessica went into her bed room to look. "No... it's unplugged."

The lighting lashed and lit up the sky again Brady could feel the power coursing through his veins. He felt elated. Jessica walked back out eyes straining in the darkness. "Tyson?" She asked, trying to ascertain where he was.

Brady slid up to her silently in the dark. He stood next to her, reveling in the feel of the heat coming off her skin near him.

He took her arm and she startled. "Right here." He said, "don't trip."

"Same goes for you. I wonder how long the power..." the lights flicked back on abruptly.

Brady smiled. "See? No time at all."

"Oh shit. I forgot to turn off the oven. Hang on. I'm gonna end up blowing us all up."

"That would be a shame." Brady said with irony. "Wouldn't want to burn down the apartment."

"No," she said "I definitely wouldn't."

"You ever think how horrible it would be to die in a fire?" He asked, his tone still casual.

Jessica grabbed a spatula and started to take the cookies off the tray one by one to stack on a plate.

She popped a cookie in her mouth. "It would suck." She replied around chewing. "You have to pray the smoke inhalation gets you first, you know. And that's not fun either."

"You can smell the flesh sizzle. " Brady replied.

"Ewww. Tyson, I'm eating. Shut up and have a cookie." She popped her head around the corner and tossed him a cookie.

He laughed at the unexpectedness of the move but managed to catch it in one hand. It was still soft and warm so it crumbled in his grip. Reduced to its parts. Butter and sugar. No matter what something appeared to be when you combined the ingredients, the sum was still merely what went into it. People seemed like light and life but really, when you squeezed them hard enough, they simply crumbled into nothing more than meat and bone. Or ash.

Brady took a bite of the his wilted cookie. It was sweet and soft and so warm.

Just like Jess.


	36. Chapter 36

"Jessica." Brady toyed with the cookie remnants. His gaze went to a little plate of cookies she must have arranged with whatever batch she had finished right before he came in. It had a folded note on top that said: _Miss You! Love you!_

"What?" Jess asked, using the spatula to unstick the others from the metallic sheet. "You want another one?"

"Yeah." Brady stood up and walked over to grab one from the reserved plate. "This is sickeningly cute."

"Hey." She scolded. "Don't touch! Those are for Sam. Have one of these. They're warm anyway."

Brady paused, his hand hovering over them. He locked gazes with her and smirked.

"Brady," she held out her spatula like a weapon. "I will smack you. Those are for Sam. I made a whole other batch."

He gave her a little grin. "I've never had a problem taking what is Sam's."

She stepped back a fraction and he saw that same _flicker_ of reticence in her eyes. She knew something was off.

He switched the path his hand traveled and grabbed one from the tray. _"Okay, okay."_

He bit into it. "So." He said around a mouthful of sugary carbs. "You know when he's coming back?"

"It's gotta be tonight. He has an interview tomorrow."

"Where'd he go?"

"I'm not sure where they ended up," she told him.

Brady gave her a little smirk. "You don't know a lot about your boyfriend."

That caught her off guard. He saw the surprise cross her face. "What do you mean?"

"Sam..." he bit into the cookie again. "You don't even know who he is."

She wrinkled her cute little nose. "What's that supposed to mean?"

"He hasn't told you _any_ of his past, has he?"

She set the spatula down and wiped her hands on a dish towel. "Sure he has."

"Did he tell you what his family does?"

"His Dad was a salesman."

"Wrong." Brady replied flippantly.

"His brother is a mechanic."

"Wrong."

"Brady what are you talking about? I know Sam."

He tilted his head. _"Wrong."_ A flash of dimples. "You're batting zero for three here, Jessica."

"What?" She'd completely abandoned the cookies and began to edge her way back from him. He tipped his head, watching her with a detached curiosity like a cat sizing up a vole.

He took another cookie. "Your boyfriend isn't the son of a salesman. His brother isn't a mechanic. And Sam has lied to you for the duration of your relationship." He took a bite. "Mm. Soft, my favorite kind."

She'd gone still and he could see the wheels turning in her lovely head.

"Yeah, you know deep down his story never added up... You know _why_ it didn't add up?" Brady asked, waving the cookie in his hand. "Because it's bullshit." He said cheerfully. "See? This is good. Confession is good for the soul." He popped the rest in his mouth.

Jessica blinked. "Brady…" she stumbled over her words. "L..look I need to take a shower and go to bed so...let's call it a night, okay?"

"Don't you want to hear the rest of the tale? Don't you want the _truth_?"

She furrowed her brow. "No. I kinda don't right now. Look, you're my friend and I'm asking you to leave, okay? We can talk tomorrow."

"You think I'm your friend." He guffawed.

He saw her blue eyes light up with hurt.

"Wrong again! You are just full of wrong today."

She backed away more and he closed the gap between them with a large step, reached out and grabbed her by the throat.

She was easier to over power than a rag doll. He shoved her against the counter and she cried out, eyes wide with fear, hands trying to pry his grip off her neck.

"Now," Brady said, reveling in the feel of her blood singing underneath his fingers in her adrenaline driven terror. "You need to get changed. You have to look pretty for Sam. I have just the thing for you."

* * *

Dean narrowed his eyes and veered around a pothole. There were so many less of them out here than in the frost bitten parts of the country, and yet sometimes they took him by surprise. They didn't seem to belong here.

His brother was brooding beside him, folding and unfolding the map he had been working with.

The conversation, the ease, the sheer _rightness_ of them being together had died with Sam's declaration that he was going back to Stanford.

Dean shoved his emotions down until he could feel a lump in his throat that made it hard to swallow. It was Sam's choice to make after all. His choice to leave his family again. Even though it was dire circumstances this time.

Dean could feel that little anxious gnawing in the pit of his stomach return. He was going to be alone. -Trying to find Dad _alone._ Sam being with him was temporary.

He blinked hard at the thought a few times. They'd never be what they had been growing up again. Sam would marry this chick, settle into his apple pie life with three kids and Dean would hardly have been a footnote.

Dean would hardly have been a footnote. ...And yet Sam had been _his_ whole purpose.

He wondered if that was how his father felt about being cast aside by his youngest.

He missed his Dad. He was all Dean had left now. All that he'd _had_ left since Sam had stormed out that door four years ago- was John Winchester. The man who fought for him, raised him, taught him everything he knew about how to be a man.

He needed him back.

* * *

Jessica stepped awkwardly into the white slip Brady had stashed in his jacket pocket. She was trembling, her clothes cast aside in a wad next to her. Brady realized he'd have to clean those up so that they didn't tip Sam off to something wrong.

"What are you doing?" She asked, her voice as unsteady as her legs. "Why, Tyson?"

She probably thought he was going to rape her. The thought had crossed his mind. But fear of Azazel kept him from it.

"I told you." A strap of her dress slid off her shoulder. He stepped forward, encroaching on her personal space like a lover and touched it with his finger. "You need to look pretty for Sam."

 _It would be his last memory of her after all,_ he left unspoken.

Jessica was terrified. He could feel her mind whirling with thoughts of escape. Biding her time, trying to figure out when to run. -Measuring whether she could catch him off guard with a blow to the head with a cookie sheet or a pan. He could almost smell the adrenaline on her. It was intoxicating.

Brady slid the strap back into place and let his finger linger on the bare skin of her shoulder longer than necessary.

He tilted his head, smiled with his vessel's charming dimples and All American looks.

"What are you doing?" She asked, feigning concern, her lip trembling. "If its drugs...we can...we can get you help. Please Brady."

Brady bent down to pick the wad of clothes up off the floor. He threw them in the oven and just as he suspected, Jessica made a break for it.

He lazily flicked his hand as he saw which exit path she was going to take and sealed the door shut.

Jess slammed into it and she tugged on it to no avail, frantic- so frantic she almost knocked loose one of the screws that held the doorknob. Brady headed toward her with the calm surety of a snake thrown a mouse in an aquarium.

She opened her mouth to shout for help and he realized it a split second before she got a sound out.

Well that wouldn't do. Someone might hear.

He cut her off by grabbing her arm and whirling her to face him, then pressing his hand over her mouth. Her protest came out as a squeak of terror. He pressed her against the wall, his body flush with hers. He could feel the soft flesh yield underneath him, her frantic panting breaths through her nose wet and warm against the back of his hand. She was such a temptation.

She struggled with him for a minute until she realized that it was utterly futile and she froze, eyes wide, like a frightened rabbit.

"Sam and his brother are about done with their little excursion. Should be on their way now." Brady let her go and he could feel the sudden release of tension as he backed away casually.

He reached out and snagged her arm, hauling her toward the bedroom. She leaned back against his pull, fighting, until he gave her a hard tug that nearly wrenched her arm out of its socket. "The melodrama isn't going to help, Jess."

She switched tactics. "Brady. We can help you. What is it you need? Money?"

He snorted.

"Then what? Please. Let me go. I won't report any of this."

Brady shook his head, releasing her wrist once they had crossed into the bedroom.

His eyes lit on the framed picture of John and Mary Winchester on their dresser. "Oh look. He still loves Daddy… even after all that." He picked it up. "You look just like Sam's mother. All that blonde hair. This pretty white outfit. I always wondered if he had a bit of an oedipal complex going on with you."

He turned to look at her. She was still terrified but she'd regained her composure amazingly well. She was an exceptional woman, really.

"Sam always wanted a mommy." Brady observed.

"Every kid wants a mommy," she said, wiping her eyes.

"And all he got was dear old alcoholic Dad obsessed with revenge." He set the picture back down with a laugh. "John Winchester was so over his head with two rugrats after his wife burned in that house."

"Revenge?" Her brow furrowed. She pursed her pouty lips. "Revenge on...who?"

"The thing that burned her."

Jessica's face betrayed her sudden puzzlement."It... it was just an electrical fire."

 _"Wrong."_ Brady said again, leaning against the dresser. "Man, I should write these down! I need to keep track of them." He paused to deliver the information. "Sam's mother was murdered."

He saw the air leave Jessica's lungs. "Murdered?"

He nodded. "Right in little Sammy's nursery. Twenty two years ago on this very day, in fact."

He saw the color leave her face.

Brady waved off her expression. "Don't worry. He was too young to remember," he scoffed. "Hardly a mind screw for him. Not the same for Daddy, I'm afraid. Daddy hasn't slept a decent night since it happened. Daddy is just a burned out shell of a pretty idealistic guy. Not anymore." He grinned. "You know why? 'Cause idealism is stupid! There, I said it. It's just stupid. This is the real world Jessica. Shit happens. If you don't know that, you're just an idiot."

Brady was enjoying himself. It was fun to have a captive audience to talk to this stuff about. She didn't look like she was having fun. Which made it more fun. Of course it would.

"So Daddy lost his shit and started dragging his kids everywhere in the continental US. And that's what Sam has been lying to you about. ...Well, one of the things. Among many." Brady paused again for theatrical effect. "John Winchester is ex-military. He raised Sam as a soldier."

He saw the surprise light her face.

"Yep. While you were learning to ride your bike and play with puppies, Sammy was learning to wield a knife and handle a shotgun. Not quite the childhood he told you about, huh?"

She said nothing.

"Your mild-mannered sweet Sammy is a bonafide hard-core trained killing machine, Jessica." He slapped the dresser, making her flinch. "Ain't that a kicker?! I mean, _hello!_ Plot Twist. Am I right?"

"Sam's never fired a gun in his life," she tried.

"Wrong. He comes from a family of killers. He was deceiving you all the time he was banging that sweet beautiful body...I mean such a _man_ , am I right? Of course I'm right! That's what men do...assholes." He kept up the friendly conversational tone. "Why do you think he never talks about his past ever? Why do you think he can best several men in a fight? Why do you think he's always such a sad sack? Put two and two together, Jess." He continued, sensing time was running short.

"Daddy disappeared on a hunting trip. _Hunting._ Yeah let that sink in. Big brother got so worried he had to come grab Sam to come deal with the aftermath. I mean, who knows what they'll find?"

He could see the goose pimples rise on her arms.

"What they'll find hunting?" She asked. "Hunting what?"

"Things like me."

Brady let his eyes turn beetle black.

* * *

Dean watched Sam walk into the door of his apartment building then turned his eyes on the road. He wanted to grab him and make him stay. Shake sense into him. He also knew he had to let him go. Sam was his own man and had to make his own decisions and he had always done that. Even when Dean didn't like them.

Sam offered Dean an olive branch. "Call me if you find him. Maybe we can get together sometime."

Dean had rebuffed the offer with a dismissive _"yeah."_ A moment later he realized it came out a little harsher than he meant it too, softened it with a _"we made a hell of a team back there."_

He hadn't realized how much he'd missed Sam. How well they worked together, almost by instinct. A look, an imperceptible shrug, a sense of what their counterpart was feeling sent the brothers immediately adjusting their course to be in unison.

Even the presence of Sam in that passenger seat- brooding, quiet Sam... Dean had missed it so much. It was like having a paralyzed limb come back to life. And now...gone. Dean wrestled back the grief until he was left with anger and frustration-emotions he was better prepared to grapple with- and drove off.

* * *

The expression on Jessica's face was priceless. It was a combination of shock, betrayal and sheer unbridled terror like he'd never seen before. Brady held out his hand and used his powers to slam her against the wall and pin her there, mute, helpless.

"All your worst nightmares. All the things that go bump in the night. All the shit you were scared of as a child. Yeah. That's all real." Brady could hear the sound of the Impala growling. "And your hero has come. Except he's too late, baby."

He raised his arm and her body slid up the wall. Brady stepped behind the tall dresser. He moved her onto the ceiling just above the bed, her long tendrils of hair haloing her face like an elaborate crown of gold.

He held her there, suspended in mute terror. Unable to warn Sam. Unable to help herself. He could hear Sam coming up the stairs. His footsteps unconcealed. He had no clue.

Brady melted into the shadows and licked his lips. He waited until he heard Sam's arrival and call for his girlfriend. And then with nothing more than a thought, Brady opened her belly. He slit her womb- the womb that one day may have born Sam's child- and saw the line of red open up like a botched c-section.

* * *

Dean Winchester didn't drive far. The street was oddly silent. Even though it was late and that alone normally shouldn't have been an issue, it made the hair on the back of his neck stand up. The night wasn't just quiet. It was that preternatural silence that signaled something wrong. Like the silence that proceeded a storm or an animal stalking its prey.

He glanced at his wrist watch, squinted to read it in the dark. The second hand had stopped ticking. It was frozen. Lifeless. Ahead of him a street lamp flickered. His hunter's instinct went off with a clear warning. Something was wrong. Without another thought, Dean turned the car around.

* * *

"Jess, you home?" Sam walked into the darkened, shadowed apartment. "Jess?"

The physical tension he hadn't been realizing he was holding drained off of him suddenly and his shoulders loosened. He went to the kitchen. A plate of chocolate chip cookies greeted him. The room still smelled of them.

He immediately saw the little note that said: _Miss you! Love you!_ Sam smiled and grabbed one, took a bite. She knew how much he loved her homemade cookies. He'd never had one before Jessica and never would after.

But he didn't know that yet.

Sam crossed into the bedroom and tossed his bag on the floor. He flopped onto the bed, settling ontop of the bedding with an indulgent sigh. It felt so good. His eyes closed. _Home._ He was home. And it would all be okay.

Something wet dripped on his face and he winced. He barely had time to react before another drip hit him.

He opened his eyes thinking there was a leak in the roof and there above him was Jessica Moore. Beautiful and terrified and bleeding from his ceiling. Sam's first instinct was to back away up the bed, scrambling for purchase. Panic shot through him. "Jess! No! No!"

And then somehow impossibly, she combusted into flames. Bright licks of flame streaming from her, consuming her and yet, not. Her face remained beautifully frozen. Adrenaline shot through him as he tried to figure out what to do. Tried to make sense of what was even happening, and the temperature in the room shot up as the scorching fire began to swirl in an angry cloud and consume the ceiling, the walls, everything.

"Jess!" He shouted.

And suddenly Dean was there, grabbing his flailing brother, who, running on sheer instinct, was trying to reach for his girlfriend. -Reach for the thing he loved most in all the world, even though the rational side of his mind should have told him that the action was futile.

"We gotta get out!" Dean hauled him backwards and Sam fought his brother like a man possessed, trying to run back into the fire that was taking the woman in his life for the second time.

"Sam!" Dean jerked him hard, hands fisted in his jacket.

Sam's long legs lost their purchase, tears steaming down his face. "Jess!" He cried, grabbing onto the battered leather of Dean's coat. "Jess!"

The fire roared and swirled and raged. Caught the writing desk Sam had saved all those years ago and sent the wood popping to life. Ate the curtains and Jessica's plants and the photograph of John and Mary Winchester.

And Jessica Moore herself.

Dean's raw strength won out and he pushed Sam back through the exit, which had miraculously stayed clear of flame, allowing their escape.

And for the second time in his young life, Dean Winchester clutched his little brother in his arms and they fled down the stairs into the clear Autumn night. The apartment exploded as their feet hit the pavement and Sam collapsed into Dean's solid embrace.

There was no John Winchester to hold them that night, but Baby stood there as she had twenty-two years ago- quiet, sleek, sturdy. She, the only witness to the twin events of November the Second, aside from two brothers.

Despite his subtleties and his convoluted schemes, Azazel hadn't foreseen everything. If he had, he would have burned her too.

 **Penultimate chapter! So hard to write. I bawled so hard I fogged up my glasses. Hahaha. If you can, drop me a review, pretty please! Stay tuned for the end.**

 **Love, Celine.**


	37. Chapter 37

Azazel helped haul the hose to another location and turned it on. The fire had died down after they'd doused it. Despite the fire truck's tardy arrival on the scene, the inferno had been contained to Sam's apartment. It was an unnatural fire. A hellfire once could say. It was only going to burn what the demon who set it wanted to. And Azazel, wearing a disheveled alcoholic fireman, was the only one who knew that secret.

Brady had caught him in the chaos on the staircase as the other residents evacuated in the beginning of the fire.

"It's done"

"Yes, it is." Azazel flashed him a smile.

The other demon lingered for a moment, as if he were waiting for approval or praise or further instructions. Or a fucking celebratory dance. Who the hell knew?

Azazel tipped his head. "What? You want a freaking medal? Get out, there's a fire in this building. You may have noticed."

The Demon Brady had done well, and even better, he had done it with aplomb. Azazel wasn't going to tell him that. But a promotion was in store.

The heavy equipment of the uniform his vessel was wearing was both constricting and almost unnecessary for him, but, he supposed it wouldn't do to have the flesh of who he was wearing melt off the minute he abandoned the meat suit. Humans were so annoyingly fragile.

Azazel kept up with the charade for a bit longer until it bored him, then he wandered over to surreptitiously observe the Winchesters. They were some distance away, standing by their ugly black muscle car. Sam was sitting on the hood, head bowed, with his brother standing awkwardly near him.

He didn't seem to be crying. The vestiges of shock were wearing off.

Dean put his hand on Sam's shoulder- a gesture of comfort that somehow felt surprisingly intimate. As if it were something sacred that should't have observers. It spoke to Azazel of an entire untapped reservoir of love within them. Sickening really.

But in the end, Dean had served his purpose. He'd dragged his brother back into hunting and unwittingly sealed his Fate.

For a moment Azazel was concerned that maybe the youngest Winchester had lost his edge entirely. He looked quiet. Lessened. The loss in his heart was visible in his entire aura. Hard to picture him leading a demon army now, much less eventually housing Azazel's own Master.

Sam's eyes tracked up to the shell of his apartment. They were flat. Hollowed. Just like John's had been so many years before. But then he saw a silent and almost imperceptible _hardening._ Sam reaching down and calling up that mettle that lingered deep down within the boy's shining soul. Sam Winchester's jaw tightened slightly, his head tilted up.

The young man circled around to the back of the vehicle lifted the car's trunk. He picked a shot gun out of the assortment of weapons in the back and cocked it, comfortable with it's heft in a way a civilian would never be.

Dean followed him and stood silently at his side. Sam allowed himself a sigh, fighting tears before he tossed it back on top of the cache. His face hardened with resolve again. "We got work to do."

The impala trunk slammed shut and Azazel smiled.

They did indeed. Sam's path was laid out before him and Azazel's favorite race horse was back in the running, straining at the bit like he'd always done. Tacked up and wearing blinders, hemmed in on both sides by the track rails and pulling ahead of the pack. If only he'd known what he was running toward.

The brothers stood together a moment longer, tall and handsome, each by the other's side. The wind ruffled Sam's hair and the lamplight glinted off the planes of their high cheekbones and strong jaws. The picture of heroes really.

It was going to be so fun to watch them crumble under the strain. So fun to see exactly how much _weight_ each could take before they buckled.

Dean would break first like a thoroughbred snapping a leg. Azazel's money was on Sam Winchester, the Boy with the Demon Blood. Giving him no choice but to harden into a lethal weapon was going to be so delightful.

Before him, under the light of the moon, Dean Winchester put his arm around his brother as the smoke curled higher.

 _ **The Beginning.**_

 _Phew! Completed finally. Thank you to my little handful of readers who stuck in through this whole thing and reviewed. It has been a long journey. Thank you soooooo much. Anyone else stumbling upon this at any time, please drop me a line. Reviews are our only payment. I've been as meticulous as I could with canon. I hope my efforts payed off. I have no clue what my next project will be. Shoot me a PM if you have any plot bunnies. Keep the bunnies within the Kripke Seasons (1-5) though. I'm toying with bringing back Ellis from my Mark series if enough readers want me too._

 _Love,_

 _Celine_


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